The Head Boy
by Telemachos
Summary: [Ch.8 Up] It's Lily Evans' last year at Hogwarts, and while James Potter isn't the prat he used to be, she still doesn't want to date him. Can Lily make him forget about her before she ends up falling in love with the very person she promised to hate?
1. Ranting and Raging

**The Head Boy**

Full Summary: It's Lily Evans' last year at Hogwarts and she's finally realized that James Potter isn't half the terrible person she made him out to be. Despite her change of heart, she still wants to remain on platonic terms with him, which is rather difficult when his feelings for her haven't changed. Now Lily has to make him forget all about her, and she has to do it without 1) ruining their newfound friendship; 2) breaking his heart; and 3) falling in love. But this is real life, folks, and no one ever said it was easy.

Disclaimer: Need I say it? Nothing's mine, everything belongs to J K Rowling. You know the drill.

**Chapter One: Ranting and Raging**

**Lily**

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It all started seven years ago, in that fateful moment when James Potter and Sirius Black decided to play that prank on me and Alice on our first train ride to Hogwarts. Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating just a little bit. Or a lot.

What really happened was that he and Sirius were sitting in an otherwise empty compartment, and I had nowhere else to go, so I sat down and tried to pretend that I didn't exist. A few grueling moments later (in which Potter and Black had both stated their names and were waiting impatiently for me to say mine), Alice walks by, a tiny blonde thing standing less than four feet tall, looking for her older brother. Naturally, James and Sirius saw her wondering around with an upset expression, and they invited her to join us, or rather them, as I still hadn't uttered a single word, apart from, "Do you mind if I sit here?"

Alice and I hit it off right there. Maybe it was because I was a Muggle and she was a Pureblood and we were curious about each other—I don't know. All I can say is that when we reached the end of our journey that night, we were thick as thieves; best friends for life. Both of us wanted to know about the other's "way of living," as you might call it. I confessed that I didn't even know about Quiddich, or Dumbledore, or centaurs or unicorns or giant squids. Soon we were off discussing all the wonders that Hogwarts no doubt had in store for us in the next seven years.

Throughout all of our animated conversation, Black and Potter were practically ignoring us, except for the few times when they asked if we could close the window or pass them some more cushions. Halfway through the trip, though, before the lady with the sweets had come by, they excused themselves (like we really cared) to go out in the halls. When they finally returned fifteen minutes later, there were two other boys with them, and Potter sported a bloody nose.

Both Alice and I jumped up instantly. But while her main emotion was concern, I shouted, "What were you _doing_? We're all going to get into such big trouble, and it's only our first year!"

Potter and Black glanced coolly over at me. "Nice to see you're concerned about our well being," Black said. "We were walking back to the bathroom, and these two here—"he gestured at the new boys—"were about to get in a fight with a couple of Slytherins. We couldn't just _leave_ them—everyone knows that if you stay around a Slytherin too long they might infect you!" At this point, he looked to Potter for support.

"It's just something you pick up later, kid," Potter advised in an annoyingly superior voice. Black opened his mouth to say something, but by this time, I had had enough. The shy disposition that I had developed when I first got on the train vanished completely as I stood and glowered at Potter.

"What makes you talk about them that way?" I demanded, my eyes sharp. Now, don't get me wrong. I was only eleven years old and barely four feet tall, but I'm sure some people will tell you that I can totally make up for my size through words and dirty looks. And I was definitely using those attributes right now.

Silence greeted my outburst. Everyone looked flabbergasted, including, to my discomfort, Alice. Trying to ignore the deep feeling of worry that was threatening to escape from my stomach, I plunged on unwittingly. "I mean, if you're anything like I am, you hardly know anyone that goes here well enough to have an opinion like that of them! I don't know what Slytherins are, but I'll bet they aren't nearly as bad as you make them out to be!"

"Um…"

The person who had spoken was Potter, but instead of the remorse and guilt I had expected to shine through his eyes, there was a totally different expression.

Amusement.

James Potter, whom I had only met a few hours ago, was _amused_ at my concern for whoever these Slytherins were!

Anger boiled up in my veins as I looked at him. More than anything in the world I wanted to wipe that silly, superior smirk off with a sharp slap across his face. In the end it was only my firm policy of "No rule breaking_" _that kept me from doing so.

It was right about then that the sweet trolley arrived. In my opinion, Potter looked slightly relieved as he quickly pulled Black and the other boys out with him. Of course, being the arrogant prick that he is, I'm sure he considered his quick exit a matter of skill and quick wit that _only _had to do with sweets. If _I _were him, I wouldn't want to be in his shoes. At least, that's what my parents and every other person who has ever been at the receiving end of one of my scowls tells me that.

Anyways, right after the boys left, Alice grabbed me and muttered, "Come on. We don't want to be here when they get back, or at least, _you _don't." I let myself be pulled out the door, and we began the long journey down the train of finding another compartment.

"What was with them, talking that way about those people!" I said, as soon as we were out of earshot.

Alice turned and gave me a one-sided grin. "I forgot that you weren't born knowing you were a witch," she said. "The thing is, once we get to Hogwarts, we get sorted into houses. And Slytherin is the worst. Everyone says that there hasn't ever been a bad wizard that wasn't in Slytherin. My brother said…" She visibly gulped and looked around apprehensively before continuing. "My brother told me there was a test or something. He didn't exactly say, but he kept mentioning that we had to make a_ speech _in front of the whole school saying why we should be allowed to go to Hogwarts…"

Anyways, that's about it. About mine and Potter first meeting, that is. Of course, me and Alice went through the sorting and we both landed in Gryffindor House (to my huge disappointment, so did Potter, Black, and the other two boys). I think that Alice was secretly a bit embarrassed, because her brother was in Hufflepuff, but after a while she was okay with it. I have a feeling that the fact of Hufflepuffs having the reputation of being "nice" (a.k.a. "wimps") and Gryffindors of being "brave" and "noble" may have had something to do with it.

Ever since then Potter has managed to stay on my bad side. Up until third year, he basically ignored me unless I happened to be a perfect candidate for a prank, but then…he discovered girls. Me, in other words. That was when the _asking out _started.

The first time he did, I was pretty surprised, and I even felt a bit sorry for him when I said I wouldn't. After he had done it for the tenth time that week, though, it started getting _really_ annoying. I even went to the lengths to hex him, but that didn't work either. It got all the way to the point when he threatened guys that asked me out and told them to stay away from me. Honestly, I haven't had a real boyfriend for more than a week in ages. You'd think he'd at least have the decency to give other guys a chance. I actually liked some of them, only he always chased them away. Then he went back to asking me, over and over, if I'll go out with him.

You would _think_ he would get the picture.

I mean, he's the most eligible guy at school; he's hot, he's rich, he's popular, he's smart, and I've even heard that he's a really good kisser. And girls absolutely _fall _over themselves when he does that annoying thing with his hair. Who _wouldn't _want James Potter?

At least, that's his line of thinking. _Maybe _I would go out with him if he really were all those things. But the fact is that he's an arrogant prick. I think I've already said that, but really, it's the best way to describe him.

All in all, I'm not exactly looking forward to my last year at Hogwarts. I would enjoy it if he just stopped asking me out, but I don't think that will even cross his mind. The thing is, I got Head Girl position. And while I'm totally excited about that, there is one seemingly _tiny_ thing that will ruin it completely.

Potter is Head Boy.

And we have to share a dormitory together.

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_Dun dun dun dun…_

_So how was it? First of all, I know it was short, but the next chapter makes up for it. Trust me. It's like seven pages. Second of all, please review! Like I said, it's my first chapter fic on this site, and I need all the help I can get._


	2. New Beginnings

Disclaimer: See chapter one. I won't be doing any more of these, so don't comment on it! You know it's not mine!

**Chapter Two: New Beginnings**

**James**

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We got to King's Cross around ten o'clock. Normally we'd have gotten there a lot later but seeing as I was Head Boy now, I figured I should put on a show of responsibility and be early.

Plus I wanted Lily to see that I was different, aka _more responsible_.

As it was, we were running late anyway because Padfoot lost the Marauder's Map—seriously, we spent a year making that thing and then, first summer comes up, and we lose it. Or he loses it. It took us a half hour to find it, even with the Accio charm, because it got caught under one of the heavy lounge chairs by the lake. It's really lucky that we get to use magic outside of school now, otherwise I'd have had to ask Dad to help us find it, and then he would have wanted to know what it was, and, well…I'm just glad we didn't have to do that.

As soon as we got there and said goodbye to my parents, Padfoot turned to me and said with a grin, "So, Prongs…what's on the agenda first? First years or Slytherins?"

In case you haven't figured it out yet, Padfoot is one of my best friends. All of his family are pureblood Muggle-haters, and after a few years of being in Hogwarts he asked if he could stay with my parents and I. Up until this summer he lived in my house in the countryside of London before he was able to get enough money to buy a place of his own. I think one of his relatives died and left him money or something. Even then, the house he got was close enough that we saw each other almost every day.

Anyway, Padfoot's real name is Sirius Black, but ever since we became Animagus in fifth year, we gave ourselves nicknames that corresponded with our particular animals. Sirius, a dog, is Padfoot; Peter Pettigrew turns into a rat and as such is Wormtail; and I, as a stag, am Prongs.

Remus Lupin was the whole reason we became Animagus in the first place. Padfoot and me found him and Peter cornered by some Slytherins on the train when we were in our first year, and ever since then, we stuck together. In second year, we found out that Remus was a werewolf (his nickname is Moony) and decided to become Animagus in order to give him some company for when he transformed. It was supposed to be a surprise, but he found out in fourth year. At first he yelled at us that he wasn't worth possible jail time, but after he cooled down enough to realize it was a good plan, he helped us find the books we needed to finish up.

Using our Animagus forms, the Marauder's Map (That's what we call ourselves—the "Marauders". The Map really was quite a brilliant invention—it shows all of Hogwarts, secret passages and all, and even has little moving dots that show where people are), and my Invisibility Cloak (Fifty-seven Galleons it cost, and not one Knut less. Got it from some old geezer who had no idea what it was and was too afraid to try it on. He thought it was made of some exotic material but was otherwise clueless as to how rare they are.), we have proudly acquired the well-earned titles of the most legendary pranksters Hogwarts has ever known. Which is why, going back to Padfoot's comment earlier, he wanted to know what we would be doing on the first day back.

I looked up at him with a smirk, waving my Head Boy badge in front of his face. "Somehow I don't think that Dumbledore will appreciate it if the supposed lead of the student body parades around hexing first years."

At this, Padfoot scowled. "Well, that's why you do it when they're not _looking_, Prongs, so they don't see who did it." He flicked a piece of mud from his shoe at me. "I didn't know you would get all goody-two-shoes on us if you got that badge; I just assumed that we would get away with more."

I smiled lazily. "_Well_, Padfoot..." I said haughtily, wiping the mud from my shirt, "I might just have to take some points away from you for saying such a thing. You sounded as if you might suspect me taking _advantage_ of my privileges!" My voice changed as I added in a more serious voice, "Besides, I don't want Lily to see me hexing someone on my first day of being Head Boy. I told you, right, that she's Head Girl—"

Sirius cut me off with a rude, dismissive gesture. "Yes, Prongs, you've told me…about a hundred times…"

"Shut up," I growled. I didn't want him to spoil the day. I had liked Lily for ages, and she never even turned to look at me unless it was to take aim and fire a quick hex that would turn my ears blue. I could dream for hours about those dark emerald eyes that burned intensely in her face, beacons in the midst of her fire red hair, about her quick and witty tongue, always coming up with a retort for whatever I had to say, about…well, about everything, really. I knew that this was it. This was the year. This was finally going to be the time when she saw that I wasn't just playing some obscure and perverted game to get her as a trophy girlfriend.

Of course, there were going to be just several small difficulties along the way. I had a mental list in my head for all the things she expected from me: good grades, _not_ talk about myself, pull no pranks (that was going to be tough), hex no one, including Snivelous (that was going to be even tougher), and _under no circumstances_ ask her out unless it was obvious she liked me.

"Oh look, our significant others have joined us," Padfoot drawled, pointing to the gateway where Moony and Wormtail had appeared, each dragging a heavy trunk behind them. They came over, Wormtail puffing slightly, and we all proceeded to get caught up on the events of the summer.­­­ All four of us had only been together twice, seeing as Moony had gone to Italy and Wormtail was forced to help his grandmother clean her cluttered house from top to bottom…three times.

I came back down to earth as Padfoot whined loudly right in my ear. "Are you _joking_, Moony? You seriously went all the way through Italy and only came back with stories of the _historical monuments_? No chicks, no raves, no prostitutes—"

"You know, not all of us spend our time like you, Sirius," said Remus dryly. "I couldn't possibly have met a girl, because we went from town to town every two days—and no, I didn't do a one night stand like _you_ always do. It's not morally correct."

Padfoot groaned to himself, muttering "historical monuments" under his breath. I rolled my eyes and glanced around to see if anyone interesting had arrived; namely, Lily. I couldn't see her, but the gathering space was getting rather crowded now, so she could be just out of my sight. If I couldn't find her, I decided, I'd just get to the Prefect's meeting early.

Moony tapped my shoulder and pointed to the train. "Want to go put our bags somewhere so Sirius doesn't feel the need to rob some first years of their compartment?"

I cast an eye at Sirius, who was now groaning over Wormtail's summer, then smiled, "I can't imagine _how_ you would come to that conclusion, Moony. To think that our gracious Padfoot would do something like that…!" I shook my head plaintively.

Remus grinned and grabbed his bags. I followed with a shout of, "See you later!" to Peter and Sirius, who quickly grabbed their trunks and caught up before we could lock the train door behind us. We trooped to the back of the train the train, yelling greetings to people along the way (I still couldn't see Lily) and eventually found an empty compartment. I dumped my trunk down, my back to the door, and lifted my arms in the air to stretch. "I swear those get heavier every year," I commented.

Sirius looked pointedly over my shoulder. Turning rapidly, I saw Lily, her arm on the doorframe and her foot tapping impatiently. I allowed an easy grin to come onto my face as I said, "Oh, hi, Evans. How was your summer?" Inwardly I cursed myself. Was that as creative as I could get? _How was your summer?_ Padfoot was going to take the mickey out of me for that one.

She lifted her eyebrows, looking like she expected the question to have some hidden, perverted meaning. "It was fine, thank you, Potter," she said suspiciously. Clearing her throat, she added, "Um, about this Prefect's meeting, then…"

I looked stupidly at her. All I could think was that she had somehow managed to get even prettier over the summer. She hadn't changed into her school robes yet and was wearing Muggle clothes that happened to hug her figure rather tightly—not that _I_ minded, of course. Her scarlet hair was longer than usual, and her bright green eyes, framed with long lashes, stood out even more than usual. What was it that girls used for that? I thought distractedly. Mascara, or something?

"…and I thought that maybe you had ideas about it?" Lily continued.

It took me a second to remember what she was talking about. "Um, yeah, I actually don't really know what goes on in there—for obvious reasons," I said. "Do we just hand out papers telling people what the standards are for the year, or something?"

Lily looked rather irritated when I said that. "Well, of course we do, Potter, that should be obvious."

I raised my hands in a defensive posture. "How would I know? I told you, I'm new at this. I've never been a Prefect. Sorry."

"Okay, then I'll probably be doing most of the talking and you can—I don't know, make lists or something," said Lily.

I frowned a little at the obvious condensation in her voice. "I'd thought the whole purpose of having a Head Girl and a Head Boy was so they would _split_ the work," I said, slightly annoyed that she had taken it for granted that she would be doing everything. Now, don't get me wrong; I really like Lily. A lot. Padfoot'll tell you; I practically never shut up about her. But I don't like people telling me that I'm stupid. Directly or indirectly, it's all the same.

Her face reddened slightly, providing a horrible clash with her hair. "Honestly, I don't know _what _Dumbledore was thinking when he put you on to this, Potter, but I guess I'll have to give you a chance."

I bowed to her ironically, causing her to scowl ferociously. Practically feeling my three friends' gazes on me, especially Moony's, I thought, _Okay, back off now, she gets the point. You're just making her hate you more_. I straightened and half-smiled at her in apology. She narrowed her eyes and continued. "So, as it is, we usually just go over what duties are, like patrolling the hallways, and then figure out when we'll have our meetings during school. It's pretty simple."

"And it starts when we get out of London, right?" I clarified before she left.

"Yeah, but we need to get there a little early. You know, to set a good example. And it's in the Prefect's compartment next to the bathroom in the front of the train," she said, sounding bored, and then, with a quick nod to Moony (_Why_ did she like him and not me!) left the compartment.

As soon as she was gone, I dropped onto a seat and tousled my hair. "She hates me," I groaned.

Padfoot exchanged a sympathetic glance with Moony over my head, then said, quite kindly, "Yes, I would have to agree with you there, mate."

"Well, the bowing thing didn't really help," said Wormtail pointlessly.

"Oh, thanks for being so helpful, my compliant comrades," I grunted. "I'm not sure, but I think I could've figured that out on my own."

"Well, you have to be less arrogant," said Remus. "She always complains about you being conceited."

I looked out the rain-splattered window. The train had left only minutes ago from a sunny, bustling London, but now they were almost into country and rain had started pelting the train as it made its solitary descent down a very long valley. _If I don't get a move on, Lily will have a reason to be mad at me again_, I thought. Sighing, I got up and said, "Well, wish me luck," and walked out in the hallway. Moony came out after me, answering my confused face with a wave of his Prefect's badge. Ah. I'd forgotten that he was still a Prefect and needed to come to the meeting as well.

"I still think it's weird that I got Head Boy and you didn't," I said thoughtfully as we walked down the train.

Remus shrugged. "I'm fine with this, mate," he said. "Head Boy does basically the same stuff, only more. So, all in all you'll be doing the work while I sit back and relax!"

I shoved him playfully into a compartment door, laughing, and walked into the Prefect's compartment. "Here goes," I said, mockingly taking a deep breath of air.

The Prefect's compartment was bewitched to be larger than the other ones. Instead of the usual benches, the furniture consisted of a gargantuan circular table with more than a dozen tall chairs around it. On the wall hung banners of all the Houses: Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and—ugh—Slytherin. Lily was sitting on the far end of the table, reviewing a pile of notes that looked as though she had written them herself.

"Hey, Evans!" I called. She looked up at me, then at the clock, then back at me. She nodded grudgingly and said, "Well, at least you were on time."

I walked over to sit next to her leaning over her shoulder to read the papers while Remus went to a group of Ravenclaws and sat down to talk with them.

"What are these _for_?" I asked, horrified.

"For all the things we need to go over," she said, taking her eyes off the stack and staring at me. I wondered for perhaps the millionth time if there was anyone else in the world that had eyes as incredible as hers were. I suddenly realized that our close proximity wasn't helping my resolve to stay romantically distant to Lily for a while. I quickly sat back and listened—at least, tried to listen—attentively as she talked about her stacks of notes.

"So this is for the procedures that need to be followed, this is for the items that are banned this year"—she looked reprovingly at me—"and the last is just for our own personal duties."

I looked at the last stack. There had to be at least five pages there, front and back. Gulping nervously, I looked up to find her watching me and ran a hand through my hair. "I guess we'll be busy, then!" I said as brightly as I could.

There had to be at least a couple minutes before we started. Stretching my legs out in front of me, I said, "So, Evans, about this year…I was wondering if—"

"Potter, may I ask _what_ Dumbledore thought he was doing?" a voice sneered from behind me. I bristled and turned around, already knowing who it was.

"Oh, it's only you," I said, barely glancing at the tall, pale boy with long, greasy hair before I turned my gaze back to Lily's papers. "I suppose you're talking about the Head Boy badge on my chest? I don't blame Dumbledore, now that I know what else he had to choose from."

Severous Snape scowled. "I know that you believe that you are a brilliant intellect, Potter, but I sincerely doubt that Dumbledore based his decision on your _responsibility_. Perhaps if your friends weren't so…_abnormal_…"

My face turned an ashen color as he said this. He wasn't going to say anything about _Remus_, was he? Ever since last year when Padfoot's prank backfired and Snape found out about Moony, he had been dropping hints all over the place. He probably assumed that Dumbledore gave me the position because I had stepped in and saved him at the last minute. And, now that I think about it, he could be right.

But still, he had no right to insult Remus—I mean, he couldn't _ask _to be a werewolf! My hand flew to my wand pocket, but as it did, I saw Lily's face. She was glaring furiously, not at Snape, but at me. I knew the warning: _Don't touch that wand!_ It took me only a second to weigh the choices. Lily liking me for once, or Snape's face the size of a hippo…

I lowered my hand. After all, I could always get Snape later. And _then_, Remus could help me.

"Maybe you think _my _friends are abnormal, but look at yourself, _Snivelous_," I snapped. "I don't think anyone else in the school has hair that greasy, and speaking of _friends, _I'm sorry to tell you that you're not very well liked outside your own House, let alone in it."

Snape flushed a dark red color and, turning sharply, left the room without a backward glance. Narcissa Black, the girl that held the position as the Slytherin Prefect in Seventh Year (Yes, yes, she is related to Padfoot. He tries not to mention it though, so don't spread it around) smirked at me and left too. Oh well, that gave me two less problematic Prefects to deal with. I turned to Lily, smiling, anticipating her gushing thanks and expressions of admiration because I had done what she said to do for once by not getting into a fight. Or…maybe not, I thought as the quill came flying in the air towards me.

"Bloody _hell_, Lily!" I yelped, standing up and trying to brush off the ink that was now splattered across my shirt.

"What the hell were you thinking!" she yelled. "God, Potter, I thought for a second that _maybe_ you would change this year, but that was totally low! Did you see his _face_?"

I stared at her disbelievingly. "See his face? Of course I saw his face—"

"Then why did you _say_ that to him?"

I couldn't believe it. I really couldn't. Had it really been two minutes ago when I was holding a normal, if slightly uptight, conversation with her? What was she thinking, supporting a Slytherin? I had given as good as I got, maybe a little more, but Snape definitely deserved it! Now she was sticking up for him?

"I said it to him because he deserved it." My voice came out hard and cold. "He not only insulted you, Lily, but he insulted my family. You can't protect him for that. I had every right. Besides, I didn't hex him."

If she would have had the grace to look a little flustered over this, I'm sure we would have been able to avoid a scene. As it was, she positively shrieked when I said that, causing all of the people in the room to turn and stare at us.

"_You had every right_? Potter, I can't believe you! Whatever Snape did to you didn't make him deserve that! Even I know that your parents aren't any of the things he said they were; who else cared what he said? But you…" She stopped for a moment, harvesting a scowl ferocious enough to scare off the meanest dragon.

"What you said was completely inexcusable. Snape doesn't have any friends; you know that, I know that, everyone knows. Hell, what you said was right—no one in his own _House_ even likes him! Black probably only left because she had better things to do."

Okay…so if she agreed with me, why was she so **crazily** mad? I opened my mouth to ask, but she wasn't finished. "My _point_, Potter, is that you're right, Snape doesn't have any friends, but how would _you_ feel if someone told you that no one liked you, and you knew they were true?"

"Not very well," I said, the words popping out before I could stop them. "But then again, I haven't ever been without friends, so why bother?"

I looked up just in time to see Lily give me a death glare before stalking out. Damn. That was probably a stupid thing to say. Looking around at the rest of the Prefects, I said, cheerily as possible, "Well, I guess this is postponed for a moment, but stay here and we'll be back in a jiffy."

Remus gave me the thumbs-up as I walked after Lily. When I got out to the corridor, I glanced both ways to see where she had gone. To my surprise, she was going further up the train, towards the place where the conductor was. "Lily, hold on a second. I'm sorry," I said, purposely using her first name.

She stared at me incredulously, seeming at a loss for words. "_What_, Potter?" she stuttered finally. "Did you say you were _sorry_?"

What, had she never heard someone say "Sorry" to her before or something? She was looking at me like I was an alien that just dropped out of the sky and asked her to marry me.

"You've…you've never said sorry before," she said.

I shifted uncomfortably. Hadn't I ever? I wondered sheepishly. I had to work on that. Maybe I _was_ conceited.

"Well, yeah…" I mumbled. "I was…well, I was thinking about what you said and I realized that you were right. I was low to say that to Snape—and to you." _Not,_ I thought in my head, _That I don't think he was a complete _bastard _for saying that about Remus._

She still looked completely shocked. I inwardly analyzed all of the meetings I'd had with her in the past. Had I really been so horrible that she was surprised to find that I was capable of apologizing? Seeming to come to her senses, Lily, in a considerably less irritable voice, said, "Well, I guess I had better say I'm sorry too, hadn't I? It's not like you were the only one at fault…I was completely horrid…"

We lapsed into an awkward silence. I, for one, was amazed. For once, Lily and I were talking as though we didn't each think the other was a total prat. And to think that Snape had been the one to initiate this! I ought to send him flowers.

"Well, Potter, I…shit. This is really embarrassing," Lily said after a few seconds. "I'm just sorry I went off on you like that. I do realize that Snape insulted your friends, and I am glad you didn't hex him. It was just that _no friends_ thing that got me, um, upset."

I shrugged me shoulders and nodded. Maybe an hour ago I would have laughed the statement off, but right now I knew _exactly_ what she meant. And I think that my new attitude might be impressing her, because she was getting more and more polite. "Yeah, I kind of…knew…what you meant after I thought about it," I said seriously. "And I hope you know that I _am _sorry, and I'm not just putting on an act."

She smiled a bit and tilted her head to the side in a kind of gesture of understanding. "Okay."

_Yes!_ I felt like leaping for joy. Still, one more step to go before our relationship would reach more desirable outcomes. And this was probably the perfect time.

"So, Lily, now that you've discovered that I'm not a complete prat and we're Head Boy and Girl together, I want to ask you something."

I wondered, just briefly, if maybe I should've waited for this. The familiar look of apprehension and suspicion was back on Lily's face, albeit without the usual anger. But it really _was_ an innocent question.

I took a breath. "I was wondering if we could, you know, start over." Jeez. What a lame start. Sirius was going to laugh at that one too. "What I mean," I plowed on, "is that we could just pretend all that stuff before never happened. Like the hexing and, um, asking you out a…a couple times…" I paused to consider the blatant lie for a moment before plunging back into my babbling state. "And I won't do that anymore, if you don't want me to. And I'll try to do my Head duties properly. And I'll even stop hexing…most…people. And—"

I was cut off with a peal of high laughter. It took me a moment to register who it was coming from, because I had never heard Lily laugh around me before unless it was a derisive, you're-a-stupid-prat kind of thing. But this now, this was beautiful. It was loud and bubbly, kind of like her voice, but there was no hint of any sarcasm or bitterness whatsoever in it. Too bad I didn't hear it more often.

"What do you want, Potter?" said Lily, still laughing.

I grinned lopsidedly, ducking my head to hide my thoughts. "I want us to call each other by our first names." What a simple request, and yet it took such a long time to get out!

Whatever she had expected me to say, that wasn't it. "Well, _James_, I think we could do that. As long as you don't ask me out. _And_ you can't stop other people from asking me out."

I smiled, not in embarrassment or cockiness, but in jubilation, though I felt slightly ashamed by the last statement. Trying to disguise my discomfort, I said airily, "Now, Lily, what _ever_ made you think I'd do something like that?"

To my surprise, she didn't fly off the handle and berate me for sarcasm, instead rolling her eyes and fighting off a smile. Inside I was singing, _Yes! Yes! She doesn't hat doesn't hate me! Yes!_ I guess one might say I was kind of desperate to be rejoicing about a simple smile, but no one knows the particular side of Lily that I do. Believe me, this was an improvement.

"Well!" I said, rubbing my hands together. "I think our darling Prefects could be worried about us, so perhaps we should go back now."

She smiled again and, side by side, we made our way back to the compartment.

I definitely made some headway today, at least, I thought. Now all I've got to do is keep it up.

I searched my pockets for a quill to write myself a note. I needed to remember to get those flowers to Snape.

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_So…chapter two! I found that I really couldn't think of a situation to make Lily really mad other than something like this, so I hope it wasn't too corny. The "talk" was kind of forced, but whatever. Like I said, I couldn't think of any other way._

_Review! Please! If you do, I promise I'll update quickly!_


	3. Dorms, Daffodils, and Discussions

**Chapter Three: Dorms, Daffodils, and Discussions**

**Lily**

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Okay, I am _really_ confused right now. I never expected anything like this to happen, or anyone like him to change. It must be a new act to try to get me to go out with him, because I can't think of any other reason he would act like this. After all, James Potter should find it impossible to deflate his ego and admit that he was wrong.

At least, that's what I keep telling myself.

But seriously, I don't know what else could have made him do it. In all of my time in Hogwarts, not once was I given the impression that Potter (Oops. I forgot about that deal about first names. I'm going to have to work on that.) could feel any sort of sympathy to someone in Slytherin, let alone Snape. To top that off, he hadn't apologized to me before—ever—and never once had he admitted that he was wrong.

Maybe I had misjudged him all this time.

Then again, my life does not revolve around James Potter, so I guess I'll move on to higher details…

After the Prefect's meeting, I found the compartment that Alice and the rest of our friends had taken. As soon as I opened the door, everyone started asking me about the meeting and if there was anything interesting that happened. Rolling my eyes, I had said, "I'm assuming that you all know about James, then." I never guessed that a simple sentence could set a group of bubbly teenage girls off into hysterics. Alice raised her eyebrow in my direction.

"You're calling him James now, then?" she had said blandly.

By the time we got to Hogwarts, I swear that every single seventh year had stopped in to ask after James, save some of those from Slytherin. Half of them seemed to think that we were going out.

"Who told them anything?" I demanded of Alice after Marlene McKinnon, a Hufflepuff and about the tenth person to come to the compartment, had stopped by. Alice sighed and looked around the compartment as an answer. I instantly knew what she meant – most of the girls in there couldn't keep their mouths shut if death was on the line. In fact, Emmeline Vance, a Ravenclaw and one of my good friends since third year, was gossiping to Susan Bones about something or another Gideon Prewett had done with some sixth year over the summer right at that moment.

At the rate things were going right now, I'd be surprised if the entire school, including the teachers, _wouldn't_ know at least one version of what had happened.

I know it sounds strange, but I didn't once even think about the possibility of _James_ having spread the wild rumors. It's kind of crazy that my opinion of him could change so quickly over the span of one day. I was pretty sure that he would refrain from making me mad due to the delicacy of our relationship right now, and embarrassing me by spreading rumors would definitely fall under that category.

Besides, much as I don't like to admit it, I really was hoping that his sudden change was completely genuine. I actually enjoyed being in the company of the "New and Improved" James Potter, who still made the occasional jokes but had stopped hexing everyone who walked in front of him. And to be honest, he _had_ put in quite a few good points during the Prefect's meeting.

I just realized that I've talked about James almost this entire time, even though I tried to move onto a different topic. I must sound like one of those giggling airheads (better known as girls) that gather around him after Quiddich games. More than half of those people are my friends, but I never got why the rest of the female population felt the need to act stupid whenever a guy was around. I really can't see myself ever doing that, especially if the guy in question was Potter. James. Whatever.

Anyways, I might as well talk about the beginning of the school year. I know I'm just repeating everybody else's thoughts, but I can't _believe_ that this is our last year at Hogwarts. After this, no more breaking curfew, no more stealing food from the kitchens, no more running away from teachers when you're caught snogging in the hallways, no more parties, or late nights spent on homework, or visiting Hogsmeade on the weekends. When this year is over, I won't see half the people in my graduating class ever again, except maybe at the ten year reunion.

It's kind of weird. I mean, Hogwarts is my whole _life_, if you get my point. At home I could never feel comfortable with Petunia and her enormous fiancé hovering about, but here I was…normal. There were other people who had had experiences not unlike my own, and I wasn't really considered a freak by most people, as Petunia so elegantly put it.

Now that's all going to be gone.

What will it be like, making our way in the world, getting married, having kids? Will our experiences at school ever leave us? I can't help but wonder how many will join Voldemort and how many will choose to fight against him. And how many of us would die in that war?

I was still thinking about this by the time we got up to Hogwarts, and I knew that other people were too, seeing their solemn expressions as we made our way up to the horseless carriages that would take us to Hogwarts.

Alice and I were the last ones to get in the carriages since I had had to make sure everyone got off the train all right and she waited for me. "Oh great," I said sarcastically, as we walked past carriage after carriage, looking for one with room. "Guess we'll have to walk—"

"Oy! Evans!" someone called from the direction to our right. Alice and I turned to see Sirius Black hanging out of a window, beckoning us forward.

"We'll just walk up, it's okay—" I started to say, knowing that they would be full with four people already in there. Sirius rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, whatever. Just come on—we can cram if we need to. Besides, you and Prewett are like one person anyway," he assured us.

Alice shrugged her shoulders at me. "Might as well, yeah?" she said, and, not waiting for an answer, grabbed the hand Sirius was offering and hoisted herself up.

I sighed. Black was in there, so that meant…_Potter _was in there. So much for quelling those rumors. I took the hand Sirius was proffering me and looked down as he pulled me up. "Thanks," I said.

Ducking my head in, I almost laughed. There was absolutely _no _room in there, what with Black, James, Remus, Pettigrew, Alice, _and _me. "Here, Lil—take my seat," said James, getting up and sitting on the floor. Sirius sighed.

"Guess that means I have to be a gentleman too. Here, Prewett."

"My name's Alice, Black. You ruin the gentleman act by saying 'Prewett,'" Alice said pointedly while I fought back a grin.

"Oops. I'll have to work on that," Black said, not in the least disturbed. "Then again, I could always make _you _sit on the floor." Alice stuck her tongue out at him and rolled her eyes.

"Whatever, Black. I just won't talk to you…Peter, though! How was _your _summer?"

Of course, after that Sirius _had _to join in, since he's such an attention seeking prat, and _that_ launched a tirade of stories that filled the rest of the ride, going from how Sirius "accidently" blew up his younger brother's new Prefect badge to Remus—dear, sweet, innocent Remus—putting clouds of yellow dye in a Muggle swimming pool that was hosting a ten-year-old girl's birthday party.

By the time we got to the castle, Alice was bent double with giggles and even I had had my fair share of laughs. But when we got out, my good mood was struck dead almost at once as a pang of sadness came over me. This was it…this would be the last time I ever saw the school again after a long summer. James heard my sigh as he came up behind me.

"I can't believe that it's gone by so fast," he said quietly. I looked up at him in surprise before answering.

"Yeah, I know. I'm going to miss it."

We fell into silence as we walked up together, but it was comfortable, not forced at all. I smiled inwardly at the thought. James and I having a comfortable silence? Something like that would have been unheard of last year.

We made it into the Great Hall and somehow Alice and I ended up sitting with the Marauders instead of our normal group of Gryffindor seventh year girls. "Hey guys," Frank Longbottom said as he pulled up a chair next to Alice, who was sitting across from me. "How many things did you blow up _this_ summer?"

Black and Pettigrew launched into their "adventures" again (although I noticed that some of them were curiously elaborated on from when I had heard them minutes ago) and ignored the first years as they went up to be sorted. When all that was done, Dumbledore said a few words about rules and classes for that year, just like he did every year, and then the food appeared on the tables.

Since I'd never eaten with the Marauders before, I never knew how fast they could devour their food. I swear that Black finished a whole plateful in two minutes before going back for seconds, and even Pettigrew, by far the smallest of the group, had his fair share of food. James seemed to eat just as much as Sirius, but to my relief, he went about it _much _neater. I sat there, aghast, and watched as the food around me slowly started to disappear before coming to my senses and grabbing some of my own.

"Are they always like this?" I asked Remus, who was the only one that wasn't stuffing his face.

"Oh yeah. You wonder why they aren't fat," he returned with an easy grin.

I smiled back. "So…how was _your_ summer?" Back in third year, when we'd done our unit on werewolves, I'd discovered Remus' condition. Personally, I had absolutely no problems with it or him afterwards, but I always felt horrible whenever I saw him at the hospital wing during my apprenticeship hours with Madame Delaney, the school nurse.

"It was…fine," he said carefully, knowing immediately what I was talking about. "It was kind of hard, what with our traveling around and all, but it was okay."

"That's good," I said seriously, though I privately thought that he was being elusive. Honestly, though, what was he supposed to say? _Oh, the summer was good except for those days when I went out as a bloodthirsty monster and almost killed that kid across the street, which would have resulted in either his death or the ruining of his life. But yeah, you know…same old, same old._

I continued to talk with him and occasionally Peter or James, and finally, after about forty minutes of having to watch Alice and Frank practically drooling over each other in front of me (She only talked about him ALL summer. For people who aren't even going out, that's WAY too much) while the Marauders played some sort of "Who Can Eat the Most" game, Dumbledore stood up again.

"I know you've all had a long day and are no doubt pining to go to your beds so you can get good preparation for tomorrow's classes—" A collective groan interrupted him, causing him to chuckle. "Well, maybe not. Prefects, please show the first years up to their dormitories, and would the Head Girl and Boy please make their way up to the front. Dismissed."

There was a scramble for the great doors that stood at the end of the hall, but James and I made our way in the opposite direction until we stood in front of the teacher's table.

"Ah!" Dumbledore said jovially as he came round to meet them. "Congratulations, again, for getting Head positions; I'm sure you'll handle them responsibly. I'll show you up to your new dormitory and then leave you to your rest." I blinked at the swiftness of his monologue and followed him as he led us out a back door I had never noticed that led to a labyrinth of corridors that I'd never seen before.

After about ten minutes of uncomfortable silence filled with Dumbledore's humming of something that sounded curiously similar to "We Didn't Start the Fire", we came to a duo of knights that stood before a banner with the Hogwarts crest on it, holding their swords out to form a cross between them.

"There you are," Dumbledore said cheerfully. "Password's 'Charybdis', but that can be changed by either of you. Enjoy!" He winked and strolled away, still humming that song. I stared after him, wondering how someone that brilliant could be so…_batty_.

"Well…are you going to come in?" James said after a moment. I turned and met his gaze briefly and nodded.

"Um…sure. Yeah." He gave me a quizzical look and said the password. I watched, impressed, as the knights clunked apart and put their swords by their sides while the banner furled itself up, revealing a large hole for us to climb into. I went in first and gasped.

It wasn't huge, but if you thought of it in terms of there being only two people living there, it was like…wow. Red and gold curtains swayed in the gentle wind that drifted from the balcony outside, and a huge fireplace crackled from across the room. Everything in there was clean, elegant, and decorated in Gryffindor colors, and I couldn't help feeling a bit smug that we got to have _this_ to ourselves while the rest of our friends pined away in our old common room that would be full of underclassmen.

Two doors on either side of the fireplace led to our respective rooms, which, I thought with amusement, had the same charms on them that the dorms in the Gryffindor Tower possessed so that any boy—or boy**s**—couldn't get in the girls' room. A huge bathroom separated them, hosting an enormous bathtub with a showerhead and a long counter with a mirror (perfect for putting on makeup, I might add) and two sinks. Ahhh! I _love _big, nice bathrooms.

Fifteen minutes later, I trudged back to the common room and collapsed on one of the armchairs next to the fire, rubbing my hand tiredly over my eyes. I should probably go to sleep, I thought vaguely as I observed the black streaks on my finger that I had unknowingly brushed from my eyes when I rubbed them.

"Pretty cool, huh," a deep voice said from behind me, making me jump.

"Oh, yeah," I agreed when I finally realized that the speaker was James, not some crazed axe murderer. "Sure beats Gryffindor Tower, at least."

He came round the back of my chair to sit across from me. "Yeah, but I don't know… It'll be weird sleeping in a room alone."

"I hadn't thought of that," I said, surprised and more than a little depressed. No more sleepovers…no more midnight truth or dare…no more waking up to screaming and giggling of dorm mates…no more sharing makeup, or shoes, or clothes…We were growing up, and we were doing it faster than I'd expected.

We sat for another moment, both not saying anything, until he got up with a groan and said, "I'm heading for bed. See you in the morning."

I continued to sit up for another hour, frowning and wondering.

Why was he so…different?

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The next morning, I woke up later than usual. That, coupled with the fact that I had absolutely no idea where the Head Dorms where in relation to the Great Hall, caused me to get down to breakfast only twenty-five minutes before the bell would ring (Yeah, I know that may _seem_ like a lot of time, but I am a _slow _eater). I made my way to where Alice was sitting with the rest of the girls in my old dorm room, Rebecca Clearwater, Piper Andersen, and Lauren Laffontein.

"Hey guys," I said, pulling out a chair and sliding in next to Alice and Rebecca. "What's up?"

"We're waiting for McGonagall to pass out our schedules," Alice said. "Aren't you supposed to help with that?"

"Oh bugger," I said. "Yeah, thanks, hun. Be right back." I grabbed a piece of toast and walked over to where James was sitting with Remus, Sirius, and Peter. "Hey," I said when I reached them. "Don't we have to pass out timetables?"

"Yeah, just a sec." He pulled out a small stack of slightly crumbled parchment from his bag. "Here," he said, waving his wand to stiffen them and get rid of all the wrinkles. "I already passed everything else to the Prefects of every House. Those are yours, Alice's, Clearwater's, Anderson's, and Laffontein's."

"Oh!" I said, surprised and grateful. "That makes things easier, then. Thanks."

He handed me the stack and met my gaze. "No problem," he said, grinning. "See you."

"Yeah, later," I said, walking away. A blush spread up my face as I heard Black say, "Man, Prongs, she's got you _whipped_."

"Here," I said, throwing the stack in between us when I got back to the girls. "Timetables."

"Thanks, Lil," Piper said, taking hers and scanning it quickly. "By the way, I saw you gaping at Potter a second ago…you starting to like him?"

I gaped at her, shocked that she (and maybe some other people) had taken it that way but before I could answer there was some sort of commotion that seemed to be coming from the Slytherin table. A lone owl soared over to a group of seventh years, having trouble keeping its balance due to the large triangular package it had in its talons.

"Oh, I hope that owl hasn't flown too far. Look at the poor thing, wobbling in the air like that!" exclaimed Rebecca, horrified. I leaned over her and Alice to see better.

"It's going to Snape!" a sixth-year Ravenclaw yelled.

"Wonder what old Snivelly did to get an owl! _I_ always thought everyone hated him," someone that sounded suspiciously like Sirius added.

A bunch of people laughed. Feeling sorry for Snape, I sent Sirius a well-deserved scowl, which, of course, he didn't see. Snape's face was bright red.

"Come on, Snape, open it!" This comment came from one of Snape's supposed friends that spent half his time with Snape, pleading for help with his Potions homework, and the other half with some of his other friends, talking behind Snape's back. I think his name is Karkaroff.

By now there was a group standing around Snape, and half the people in the hall had actually stood up so they could see what was in the package. I got up quickly and marched over to the Slytherin table in order to break things up so Snape wouldn't have to open his mail in front of people, but by the time I got there, someone had hexed the box open.

There was a momentary silence in the halls before almost everyone started laughing. Out from the box had popped a bushel of pink and yellow daffodils, big ones, followed by a cloud of lavender butterflies that formed the words, "Thank you, Severus!" in curly, glittering letters. Several seconds later the butterflies exploded out like fireworks and accumulated on Snape's clothing, turning him into a fluffy ball of purple. The flowers kept expanding and shrinking through the stages of growth, blooming and shriveling up and blooming again. If I hadn't been so shocked I would have admitted it to be an amazing work of magic; as it was, the look that Snape wore on his face was enough to make me feel sorry for Adolf Hitler.

I walked briskly in the crowd, saying, "Alright, everyone, there's nothing else to see…Come on, get back to your tables and sit down before McGonagall comes over…" This was enough to disperse the giggling crowd. James, I noticed, had stood up and was assisting me in getting people back to their seats.

As soon as everyone was more or less situated, I thanked James and walked back to the Gryffindor table, where everyone's conversations had turned over to the flowers. I sat down, huffing slightly, and grabbed another piece of whole wheat toast.

"Did he say who it was from?" Alice asked.

"No," I said. "I feel kind of bad for him, though…imagine having everyone laugh at you for getting _flowers_! But," I added sheepishly, "It _was_ kind of funny. If it was a relative that sent them, they obviously didn't know about his reputation." Shaking my head, I said, "Alright, what classes have you lot got today?"

The talk turned to other subjects, and when I was done with my toast, I decided to go get all of my things ready for class and maybe do something else with my messy hair. I walked past the rest of Gryffindor table, waving to a few people I hadn't talked to since the summer as I went, and made my way out of the Great Hall. Without paying attention, I walked through the doors and turned the corner to run right into James. He grabbed my arms to stop me from falling.

"Thanks," I said breathlessly, hoping my face wasn't the same bright red color it always seemed to get when I was embarrassed.

"Where are you headed?" I noticed that he had his broomstick in one hand.

"Oh, just to the dorm so I can finish getting things ready for Charms. If I can find it, that is. You?"

"Just went out to the pitch for a few minutes. I heard they put in new goal hoops and I wanted to see what they were like," he replied. Well _duh_, I thought. What else would he be doing with a _broomstick_? Sweeping the floors? Honestly, I ask the stupidest questions sometimes. "Do you want help getting to the Head Tower?"

"Oh, no, that's all right," I said quickly, not wanting to cause him any trouble. "I have plenty of time, I'll just—"

The bell rang. I sighed, the words running out of my mouth before I could finish them.

"Here, I'll help you get there. I have to go put away my broom, anyway," he supplied, beginning to lead me up to the tower.

"Thanks," I said. "Actually, I probably would've got lost and been twenty minutes late."

He grinned at her. "Oh, no! The great Lily Evans, late to class? Has that ever happened before?"

I rolled my eyes. "Third year, Potions class."

His laugh faded slightly as he looked at me, shocked. "You've only been late to class _once_?"

"Well…yeah. Unexcused, that is," I said slowly. "Why does that matter?"

He shrugged. "I've been late too many times to keep track even if you do it by _month_. But it's not going to be like that this year, I promise!" he added quickly when he saw my raised eyebrows.

I couldn't help it. I laughed. "Man, I really _do _have you 'whipped'!"

He flashed me one of those charming Potter smiles. "Of course! Here, turn this way."

I turned the next corner and was surprised to see the two knights and the banner right in front of me. "How could you—?"

"Shortcuts. They actually come in handy for lots of things besides pranks," he said. I gave the password and walked in my room to grab my Charms books. When I got out, I found him waiting for me by the door, broomstick discarded. He turned, saw me, and smiled. "You ready?"

I nodded and followed him out the door. "Here, I'll take these for you," he said quickly when he saw me struggling to hold onto my books.

"No, no, I can handle them. It's fine," I protested. He ignored me and lifted them out of my hands. "Really, they were fine—you are so insufferable sometimes."

He grinned teasingly at me again. "Well as long as I'm insufferable anda gentleman at the same time." I shook my head but didn't say anything.

After all, I always liked a gentleman…

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A week later, James and I had progressed to the stage of waving and talking in the hallways. Yes, it was always about Head duties and stuff like that, but it was better than hexing each other. Although we had Transfiguration, Charms, and Defense Against the Dark Arts together, we rarely talked except in Transfiguration. As much as I hate to admit it, James happens to be annoyingly proficient in that class, and even McGonagall says that he'll turn out to be better than both her and the Headmaster in that particular area. Our situation, in other words, was good enough for me.

About the third week we'd been back, though, our relationship changed from polite acquaintances to actual friends. After a note from Professor McGonagall, I found James and asked him to meet me in the library after classes ended so we could discuss patrolling duties. He agreed to meet me at four o'clock later that afternoon so we could figure out our schedule. I couldn't help but be a little impressed by the fact that he did, not once, complain of missing valuable time with his friends. As it was, I was almost looking forward to our meeting and got to the library slightly earlier than the time in which we had proposed to meet.

When I got to the table we had decided to meet at, I was more than a little surprised to find him already sitting there with a pile of books, his head bent down as he scrawled on a long sheet of parchment paper that was already half-filled with tiny, close-written words.

I stopped and stared at him for a moment, taking in his dark hair, his slim, muscular body, and the way the light glanced off his glasses when he tilted his head to reread a sentence. His hand trailed up absently to his head and passed through his hair, ruffling it lazily. He leaned on an elbow and thoughtfully started chewing on the tip of his quill, his eyebrows meeting to form a single line across his forehead as he mulled over the words on his scroll. A blush started to creep up my face. I'd never really noticed it before, but I guess I could almost describe him as…handsome. No; never mind that—it wasn't an "almost" thing—he _was _handsome.

The chair next to James moved, even though I couldn't possibly guess what had caused it to; after all, there was no one else around. James glanced up, his hand still in his hair, and saw me standing there, clutching a bookbag and looking like a deranged convict being caught trying to escape. I blushed furiously and walked up to him, saying in the airiest tone I could manage, "I didn't realize you'd actually get here early!" How long had I been standing there simply watching him? I must have looked like a complete idiot. Hopefully no one saw me.

"Oh, hey," he said, standing up and proceeding to move all his books to one side of the table so I could sit. As he was doing this, his eyes flicked to the nearest bookcase. "I thought I'd, er, get started on an Arithmacy assignment that Professor Gregora assigned us."

"Oh!" I said, impressed. "Is Arithmacy hard? We haven't had any big assignments in any of my classes yet." James Potter was _working_? On an assignment that had only been given _today_?

"It's not too bad," he answered, pulling out a chair for me and sitting down himself. "Professor Gregora likes to assign projects at the beginning of every year. I've had her three times."

"I guess I'm glad I didn't take Arithmacy, then," I said with a smile, and, taking the proffered chair, set my bookbag on the table and took out a roll of parchment. "So, not to change the subject or anything, but I have a list of corridors and rooms that McGonagall told me we have to check every night we patrol."

James lifted the scroll with interest and quickly scanned it. "Looks good to me. All the right places, of course," he added with a grin. "What do we have to do, just walk by and send people back to bed if we catch them?"

"Yeah, and if we do catch people we write them up—just stuff like their name, House, where they were and what they were doing, and sometimes the proposed punishment. Here's the slip." I handed him a half piece of paper that I had taken out of my bag. He looked at it for a moment, nodded, and gave it back to me.

"Who's going to be patrolling? Just us?" There was a peculiar glint in his eye as he said this, but it wasn't the look I had come to despise in our earlier years when he would ask me out. It was something else that I couldn't seem to place that almost seemed like…diffidence.

I shook my head and banished the thought. "McGonagall wants just the Head Boy and Girl to patrol. Apparently there've been bad experiences when Prefects have patrolled in the past."

"And are we patrolling every night, then, or every other night, or what?" he said. "I have to figure in Quiddich practices too, but I've waited to schedule anything before I knew what we were doing."

He waited? He put _Head _duties before Quiddich? Wow. _Everyone _knew that the only thing that came before Quiddich—in James' opinion, that is—was pranking other people with Black, Remus, and Pettigrew. I hadn't realized Head Boy meant so much to him.

Trying to disguise the surprise and appreciation that I felt, I replied in as nonchalant a voice as I could muster. "Oh, that's a good idea. What do you prefer? I had thought that Monday, Wednesday, and Friday would be good, skipping Saturday and Sunday. What do you think?"

"Sounds good to me, except…could we maybe alternate that for every other week and then patrol Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays the other weeks? I want to have time to do homework for all my classes."

He wanted time to do homework. He wanted time to do _homework_, for Christ's sake! And he was willing to give up his Saturday night for Head duties! Even I have a slight unwillingness to do that, but now that he mentioned it I can't back down. No one would ever say that James Potter put in more effort for Head duties that Lily Evans.

So I said, "Yeah, that sounds okay. Makes sense."

"Right. Cool. Do we have anything else to talk about?"

"Nope, except that McGonagall wants us to start this Monday. She said that too many people have been out and about already," I said, standing up and picking up the papers that I'd taken out of my bag. "So I guess I'll see you around?"

"Uh-huh," he said, taking his eyes off his scroll of parchment to flash his charmingly dimpled Potter smile at me. I quickly ducked my head as I flushed a dark red, attempting to hide my temporary change of color. No need for him to make presumptions.

"Oh, wait, before you go—" James stood up to grab my arm. "Listen, did you do that assignment Flitwick gave us for Charms?"

Assignment? What was this? "I don't remember getting one," I said, confused. "I was pretty sure I didn't have any homework, actually."

James bit his lip. "Really? Maybe it was for another class or something. We had to go in our books and memorize the eight incantations listed there for a quiz next class."

"Oh shit," I said, dumping my bag and digging in it frantically to try and find my book. "I _do_ remember that! I must have forgotten to write it in my planner!" I located the Charms book, opened it to page fourty-eight, and, sure enough, there was a little note I'd written to myself that said to memorize the incantations.

"Oh wow. Lucky you reminded me, otherwise I would've forgotten to do it." I smiled gratefully at James, who grinned back.

"No prob. Anyway, can you look at number six for a second? I don't know what I'm doing wrong, but I can't seem to get it right."

I glanced down at the parchment. "Oh, that. See the little symbol there? That means you have to say or think the words before you move your wand. Here, look." I demonstrated the charm, focusing on a pen in my bag that couldn't be seen from where I was standing. With a gurgling sound, the pen popped out of the middle of nowhere into my hand. "See?"

James stared intently at me as I did the movement. "Oh, I get it." He repeated the same gesture I did, and, with another squelching sound, a tube of toothpaste appeared into his hand. "I can't stand the feeling of having dirty teeth," he explained sheepishly as I scrutinized the little bottle with mystification. "I brush them every time I eat."

"Well, that's probably a good thing. Maybe that's why I have cavities every time I get mine checked," I smiled, tilting my head to look at his teeth. They were white and perfect. I grabbed my bag again and said, "I have to go. I promised Alice I'd meet her at five."

He grinned. "No problem. By the way, thanks for the help."

"Yup. Hey, did we have any other homework that I might have forgotten about?"

"No, except for practicing that spell for Transfiguration; you know, where you turn individual body parts into those of an animal."

Damn. I'd forgotten about that one too. I was _not _starting the year out very well. "Shit, thanks. See you later," I answered.

He grinned at me and went back to his parchment. I walked towards the exit, humming as I went. That was actually kind of fun, I thought. Maybe patrolling will be too. It might be nice to have someone to joke around with while working.

Turning the corner to go out the door, I glanced behind me back at James. Remus, Black, and Pettigrew were all sitting at the table now, and a huge, folded up piece of parchment was between them. How had they gotten there so quickly? I wondered. Peering over a bookcase, I spotted a silvery piece of cloth that was draped over the side of James' chair. What was that? I took a step closer, but just then, Black looked up and saw me. He punched James' shoulder and gestured towards me, but before he could turn around, I had run through the double doors and out into the empty hallway.

No need for him to make presumptions.

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_I was reading this over and I realized how much of a **dork **James sounds like, which was definitely NOT the image I was going for. Only I didn't feel like going back and editing all the parts where he came in, so I'll just try and fix it in later chapters. Sorry about that. _

_In the meantime…see that little button down there? Yes. Click, type, and you'll make me so happy! It's sad how many people read fics and don't review them. **Change the statistics!!** _


	4. Leading Him On

_So I've decided to continue for a while. Thanks to _names are overrated _and _predictable _for your constructive criticism; you guys are the ones who inspired me to do this. Now you have to review and tell me if I did a better job with the whole predictability thing… :D_

_Here's the **real** chapter:_

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**Chapter Four: Leading Him On **

**Lily**

"Um…June of 1498?" I guessed wildly, briefly wondering why anyone would _want _to know when the leprechaun civil war ended.

James looked up mischievously from the History book he was propping up on the window and said, "Did Lily Evans just answer a question with a _guess _rather than a positive answer?" I glared mockingly and slapped him on the shoulder.

"Shut up," I said, trying to sound upset but failing rather miserably. He rolled his eyes.

"Whatever, you got it right anyway." He yawned, looking at his watch and closing the book with a snap. "We should probably go make one last round before we finish."

It had been three weeks since I met with James for the first unofficial Head meeting in the library, and during those three weeks we had gotten to know each other even better. Every other night we went patrolling together, and far from being boring and painful like I thought it would be, James had made it into something that I actually looked forward to. Today we had slacked off of most of it, studying instead for the History of Magic test we had the next day.

"Okay," I said, standing up from my crouching position by the wall and dusting myself off. I looked up to see him staring at me with an odd expression in his eyes. "What?"

If I didn't know James Potter, I would've sworn that he blushed. "Nothing. You look gorgeous," he drawled, a genuine smile flitting across his face before he replaced it with an arrogant smirk that I knew well.

"And don't I know it," I teased, crossing my arms, leaning backward, and raising my eyebrows to imitate him.

"I was being perfectly serious!" he said, pretending to be affronted. He offered me his arm in a sweet, gentlemanly gesture and said, "You have to go and get your beauty sleep, princess, so let's finish this."

I grinned and accepted his arm. "Okay, since you want to get away from me so fast!"

We walked around by the Astronomy Tower before heading back to the Head Tower fifteen minutes later, joking and laughing all the way there. When we got to the two knights, I looked up at James and teased, "So, James Potter, you're not too bad to hang out with after all."

"What, you had doubts?"

I rolled my eyes at the typical "Potter" response. "I don't know. Either that or I was just faking my intense dislike for you for six years."

I instantly regretted my words. The carefree expression on James' face had disappeared. "I'm really sorry about that, Lil," he said quietly. "I never meant to hurt you, or anything—"

I cut him off with a wave of my hands and a nonchalant smile. "It's okay James, really," I assured him. "I don't even think about that anymore. Whenever I do I just feel bad for not getting to know you better."

He grinned, a shadow crossing his face as he stepped a little closer to me and leaned forward a bit. "Anything else you feel bad about?" he asked, his voice a bit lower than normal.

"Hm," I said thoughtfully, taking his words in jest. "I suppose you want me to say sorry for breaking your little heart—"

He stepped back a bit and flashed me a grin. I couldn't help but notice that it was a little forced. "Yeah, broke it far too many times. And you're _still _doing it." He added the last statement in an undertone that I don't think I was supposed to hear, and, feeling uneasy, I decided to joke about it to get out of the awkward situation.

"Aw, I'm sorry," I cooed. "For breaking your heart a million times. How am I going to make it up to you?" For a second I was afraid that he would kiss me, doing something that we would both regret, as a strange look came across his face, but before I knew it, he was holding the "door" that led to the Head dorm open for me.

"I'll tell you when you can do it," he said, grinning, as he followed me to the couch and plopped down next to me, facing the fire. I raised one of my eyebrows.

"Oh? And what does that mean?" I inquired, half- jestingly, half-fearfully. After all, I had been around the Marauders for all six years of their reigning terror and believe me, _no_ one wanted to be at the base of their pranks. Which is why I always feel bad for Severus Snape.

"You'll just have to wait and find out," he said self-importantly, settling down so his eyes appeared hooded in the firelight. He brushed away his messy black hair from hanging across his forehead and used his right hand to push up the bridge of his glasses.

"Just don't do anything to make me hate you again," I smiled, slipping down so that my head lay on an armrest. My eyes fluttered shut as he regarded me with an amused expression.

"I won't," he said in a soft, somber tone that made me wonder how seriously he actually took my words. "Here, let's get you upstairs, Lil." He picked me up, his arms strong enough to lift my whole body with ease, and carried me up the stairs to my room.

"I thought you couldn't get to the girls' rooms," I mumbled, burying my head in the crook of his arm. I could almost hear his smile.

"Sirius learned how to bust it in third year. I just dismantled it—don't worry, I'll put it back on."

"That's okay, James. I trust you," I said, yawning hugely. I heard him make a slight intake of breath as he held me a little closer to his chest, his muscles tightening around my slender body.

"Goodnight, Lily-Flower," he whispered as he opened my door and tucked me into my unmade bed. I smiled in my sleep, not even wondering how he had found out my childhood nickname. He was, after all, my very own stalker for almost six years.

"Thank you, James," I mumbled against my pillow as I tugged the sheets around me. I barely heard the door shut behind him before I fell into darkness, swimming in dreams of flowers and light and the flutterings of white doves.

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"Alright, class, settle down," Professor Flitwick squeaked from the front of the room. "I know this is the last class of the day and you have a weekend to look forward to, but let's not spend the rest of the period talking!"

No one was listening. At the back of the classroom, Sirius and James were sending brightly colored bubbles to tangle in Piper Anderson's hair while she flirted unknowingly with Edmund Patil, a Ravenclaw, who was having trouble keeping his laughter down. Alice and I were huddled together a few rows in front of Piper when Emmeline Vance came over and sat in front of us on the desk.

"Oh my gosh, it feels like I haven't talked to you guys in ages!" she said, throwing her dark hair over her shoulder. I rolled my eyes.

"Yeah, whatever, Em. Like yesterday didn't count," I said, grinning despite my sarcastic tone. She huffed.

"Well, we haven't had a girl's night out for a long time, at least," she amended.

"Oh, I know," I sighed. "I haven't had one with Alice, Lauren, Rebecca, and Piper either. It's this stupid dorm thing."

"Wait, you have your own dorm?" Emmeline asked excitedly. I nodded. "Well we should have a girl's night out there!"

"Ooh, that sounds like fun!" Alice said, leaning forward in her chair. "Emmeline's right, Lily, we haven't really talked like that in forever! We can invite a few people over—"

"How about tonight?" Emmeline interrupted. "I haven't got a date or anything lined up, and we can ask a few other people too, it'll be fun! And then we can go to Hogsmeade together on Saturday!"

"It'll be so much fun! We can get food from the kitchens, use your magic record player, gossip…please, Lily?" Alice rejoined.

"I'll check with James," I said, my earlier reluctance slipping away.

"Well go over, he's right there! Flitwick won't care," Emmeline prompted, pushing me out of my seat and sitting in it herself.

"Where's my choice, yeah?" I complained, getting up from the floor and brushing off the back of my robes to get the dirt off. "I'll just send a note."

"Why? He's right there."

"I don't want to get bubbles in my hair," I mumbled self-consciously, running my hands through my bouncy curls.

"And you say _I'm _vain," Emmeline muttered, picking out a cat hair from her robe and throwing it to the side. I ignored her and grabbed a slip of parchment from Alice. Taking Emmeline's former seat (mainly, the desk), I wrote,

_James,_

_Emmeline, Alice, and a few other people wanted to know if they could come over to the Head Tower tonight. Do you mind?_

_Lily_

I folded it up and charmed it to fly over to him. He grabbed it out of the air and read it quickly. He scribbled something on a scrap of parchment and flew it back over to me.

_Passing notes in class, Lily? What would your parents think?!?_

_Go ahead with your plans tonight. I was going to hang out with the guys anyway._

_How'd you do on Binns' test?_

I smiled and showed the note to Alice and Emmeline before writing back.

_James,_

_Thanks. My parents would be horrified, so don't you dare send a letter._

_I think I did well on the test. Must have been that good study session last night!!! How about you? _

_Lily_

The bell rang before he could write a reply. I packed my bag and slung it over my shoulder, calling, "Come over after dinner and we can go to the Tower together!" to Emmeline's departing back.

"What were you doing passing notes to James?" Alice asked as soon as we had walked out the door.

"Just talking," I said, confused. "Why?"

She sighed and seemed about to tell me something when I felt an arm drape around my shoulder. I turned around to see James grinning innocently at me. "I think I failed the test."

"How did you fail it? We studied _all _night!" I said, laughing and shoving him lightly on the shoulder.

He shrugged. "It's History of Magic. Who cares."

"Oy, Prongs! Come here, Wormtail's just—" Sirius' voice was drowned out by the sudden screeching of Piper, who had apparently just realized that the bubbles were still in her hair and they weren't coming out.

"See you later, Lily," James said hurriedly, rushing off to help Sirius and the others fend off hexes from Piper. I looked on amusedly, wondering if I should do something since I was Head Girl, but decided against it. James seemed to be doing fine. I turned back to Alice.

"What were you going to say?" She shook her head, still looking slightly grim, and just mumbled something about going to dinner and telling me later. I shrugged and pushed a strand of hair behind my ear. Couldn't have been anything _too_ serious if she didn't need to tell me now, right?

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"How come Lauren and Piper couldn't come again?" Alice asked.

"Double date with the Edmund Patil and Amos Diggory," I said unconcernedly, ripping off a piece of a Pumpkin Pasty. "Like that's a big surprise, though."

Emmeline snorted. "No kidding. I think they're even worse than me as far as boys come. Speaking of boys—did you hear about Heather Abbot—you know, Henry's younger sister—and Benjamin Summers?"

Rebecca Clearwater wrinkled her forehead. "You mean the fact that she dated him for a month and it turned out she was sleeping with his brother the whole time? Yes."

My jaw dropped open. "Are you serious? Why would she do that?"

"Yeah, Ben's actually nice," Alice protested, her expression similar to mine.

Emmeline shrugged. "Like you said, big surprise. She goes through the male population like they're bread to her butter."

"Nice expression," I laughed, leaning forward to switch on the record player.

"What's this one, now?" Rebecca said. "I like the tune."

"The Beatles. You know, the Muggle band," Alice answered for me, picking up a Chocolate Frog and singing along with the song. "_I don't care too much for money—money can't buy me love…_" Rebecca and Emmeline looked at me quizzically.

"You've never heard of the Beatles?" I gasped, horrified. "Alice, they've never heard of the Beatles!" Alice gaped at them.

"_You've never heard of the Beatles_?" She said, shocked.

"We don't listen to Muggle music," Emmeline said pointedly. "Don't expect us to know some obscure old Muggle band. Why would they name themselves after a _bug_, anyways?"

Alice and I exchanged a glance and burst out laughing. "What?" said Rebecca.

Emmeline shook her head. "Give me a sec, I'll shut them up." She reached out to grab the bag of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans. "So, _Lily_, what's up with you and James?"

I nearly choked. "_What_?" I said, looking around, my laughter quite forgotten, at Emmeline. Innocent gazes from her, Rebecca, and Alice met me halfway.

"Well?"

"Nothing's going on," I said defensively. "We're just friends."

Emmeline nodded sarcastically. "Right. Just friends. And that's why you flirt constantly with him."

"I do not flirt constantly with him!" I defended myself. "You're going nutters, the lot of you."

"That's actually what I wanted to talk to you about," Alice said soberly. "Lily, if you don't like him, stop flirting with him. It looks like you're leading him on."

For the second time that night my mouth dropped open. Had it really looked like that? Now that I thought about it, though, I knew Alice was right. My face went warm as I remembered the night before, when it almost looked like he was going to kiss me but I had—somehow—managed to back out of it.

"Oh," I said, horrified. "I didn't mean—I don't even like him."

"Well you act like it," Alice said. "Maybe you don't see it, Lily, but for the rest of us it's pretty obvious that he's practically in love with you." She looked at the others for support.

"Yeah, you can totally tell," Emmeline agreed. "Didn't you see the look he gave you when you passed him the second note? His whole face lit up. He probably thought you wouldn't answer again."

"Has anything happened during patrols?"

I felt my body tense up as I looked at Rebecca. "What do you mean?" I said carefully.

"Oh no, Lily, you didn't do anything to lead him on _more_, did you?" Alice said. I looked down guiltily.

"I didn't mean to!" I said. I looked up to find that every one of their gazes were fastened on me. "It's just the way we talk. I didn't even think that I might be _flirting_, but—"

"What happened?" Emmeline said. I could practically hear her gossip sensors go "bing" as she propped her elbows on her knees and stared at me. "Did he try to kiss you or something?"

"How did you know?" I said before I could stop myself. I clapped my hands over my mouth right away. "I did not just say that," I mumbled, my face now resembling a tomato.

"Lily! How come you didn't tell me?" Alice exclaimed. "What happened? When was it?"

I dropped my head in my hands. "I didn't mean for it to happen. We finished patrolling last night and were walking to the Tower, talking like we usually do—"

"What? You mean _flirting_ like you usually do?" Emmeline sniggered. I scowled.

"Shut it or I won't tell you. Anyway, we were just going back and forth when we somehow got on the subject of the last couple years and he just said how sorry he was. I just sort of shrugged it off and was like, 'Oh, whatever, I was bad too, and I'm sorry I didn't get to know you before I decided to hate you.' And he kind of smiled and said, 'Well, anything else you're sorry for?' and he started to kind of lean forward like he was going to kiss me. But I said something and I guessed that ruined the mood so we went into the common room and didn't talk about it anymore."

"Wait—that's it? You said something and just…what? Went to bed?" Rebecca said, her eyebrows meeting on her forehead. I blushed.

"Well, no. I sort of fell asleep on the couch and he picked me up and tucked me into bed," I mumbled sheepishly.

"Lily…" Alice groaned, falling backwards and hitting her head on the carpet. "See what I mean about leading him on?"

"Forget that for a second!" Emmeline said. "What was it like? I bet his arms are just as muscular as Amos's." We all stared at her. "What?" she said defensively.

"We all know James Potter, and he _definitely _has some muscles that weren't there in first year," I admitted, breaking the silence and blushing furiously.

"I thought you didn't like him!" Alice cried over Emmeline's and Rebecca's giggling.

"I don't!" I said quickly. "Besides, it takes more than looks to make me like a guy. He has to be nice, and mature, and smart—"

"Exactly what James has become, you mean," Rebecca said with a smile, cutting me off.

"No, it's not!" I protested. "Honestly, you guys act like I'm in love with him. Just because I notice that James is handsome—"

"Ah-hah! So you admit that he's good looking!" Emmeline said brightly.

"_No_! I just—argh!" I stopped talking and crossed my hands over my chest, glaring at them. "I'm going to the bathroom." I stalked out with as much dignity as I could muster, but when I got to the bathroom, I sagged against the wall and closed my eyes.

Did I really like James Potter? I pondered the question for a moment, mulling it over in my head. No, I decided. James and I were just friends. We had too much of a history to ever be able to have an actual relationship, and we were too different. Okay, maybe not _really _different, as I realized when our time as Head Girl and Boy progressed, but certainly not alike enough to be able to date.

I sighed and tugged a lock of my auburn hair. It really was getting too long, I mused, examining the ends of my waist-long locks. Perhaps I should cut it. My eyes roamed to my face and I scowled. I was too pale and freckly to be pretty, and my intense emerald eyes stood out far too much from my face (not that my mascara and eyeliner was helping too much). Not to mention my body was too skinny and my feet too small…

"Lily! What are you doing in there, having a picnic?" Emmeline called. "Alice is just about to tell us about Frank!"

I walked out to see Alice just as red as I was a minute ago and grinned, my anger quite forgotten. "Okay, let's hear all the juicy details," I said, sitting down cross-legged and beaming up at her.

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"Lily! Come on, get up!" I opened my eyes drearily only to see Emmeline's big blue ones staring right at me from only two inches away.

"Ahh! What the bloody hell are you doing!" I yelped, scrambling away and hitting my head on the table in front of the fireplace. "Ouch." I'd forgotten that we'd fallen asleep in the common room.

Emmeline rolled her eyes. "It's already ten. We've been waiting for you to get up for almost a half an hour now." I looked around to see Alice and Rebecca, both looking like they would rather have been still sleeping, glaring at Emmeline, who apparently didn't notice. "Anyway, we need to do our hair, makeup, and outfits before we go!"

Almost at once, we sprang into action, all early morning exhaustion gone. Emmeline, the beauty out of the lot of us, pooled all of our makeup together while I got out my wand and the book on hair spells that I got a few years ago from Lauren Laffontein as a Christmas present. Alice and Rebecca grabbed the bags they brought with all their new clothes that they had picked up over the summer (shrunk, of course, so they would fit into one bag) and ran up to my room to grab my stuff.

"Here, let's go up to the bathroom," I said, levitating all of our cosmetics up the stairs.

"Ooh! Lily, if I was jealous of you before, it's nothing like now!" Alice marveled as she stepped into the huge bathroom.

"I know! How come we can't have bathrooms like these?" Emmeline complained. "Look at all this sink space!"

"That's what I said when I first saw it!" I said, spreading all the makeup on the counter and magically hanging the clothes on the wall. "Let's get to it, then!"

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An hour later, we filed out of the common room, all primped and prettied, and made our way to the Great Hall. "So…" I said on the way. "Do you guys have dates or do you want to go to Hogsmeade together?"

"I don't," said Alice. "Em? Becca?"

"Nope. We should go shopping!" Emmeline said excitably, holding open the side door that led to the Great Hall for the rest of us. "I hear there's this new place called Lester's—"

"Lily, James is staring at you," Alice interrupted.

I forgot about Hogsmeade at once. "What do I do? If I've already acted like I like him then I don't want to give him the cold shoulder!" I panicked, feeling very self-conscious in my gray-plaid skirt and low-cut black blouse.

"Just…pay attention. And _don't _flirt," Emmeline advised. "I got to go over to the Ravenclaw table. Want me to meet you in a half hour in the front?"

"Sounds good," I said unenthusiastically. Alice, Rebecca, and I went and sat at the end of the table with Lauren and Piper.

"How'd your guys' dates go?" I asked, grabbing a piece of whole-wheat toast. After last night I would have to watch what I was eating unless I wanted to get twenty pounds overweight. Which I didn't.

"Awful," said Lauren at the same time Piper said, "Great!"

"Come on, let's hear the details," Alice said. Lauren instantly launched into a tirade about how Amos had kept talking about this girl from Hufflepuff and hadn't even once commented on how she looked or anything like that. Piper, on the other hand, kept saying how wonderful and sweet Edmund was and how he'd kissed her goodnight right in front of the full moon.

"I just wish James would notice me," Lauren said. My head snapped in her direction.

"_What_?"

"Well, I've liked him ever since we came back from vacation," Lauren said, unperturbed. "Lily, since you don't like him, could you maybe talk to him for me? Just drop a few hints or something? I know that you guys are friends."

"I—I could do that," I said, feeling a bit odd. I never thought that Lauren, of all people, would fall for the _new_ James.

"Thanks, Lily, I just love you!" Lauren said, wrapping her in a one-armed hug. "So what did you guys get up to last night? I bet it was more fun than ours."

I dropped out of the conversation and risked a glance down the table only to see that James was looking directly at me. I smiled a bit and let my gaze drift over the rest of the table so it wouldn't seem like I had been looking for him specifically. James and Lauren. Lauren and James. The names sounded good together. I straightened a bit and finished my toast. James deserved someone nice, and he needed to get over me soon, so this was a perfect opportunity. If I managed to play my cards right, this might just work.

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Twenty-five minutes later, Alice, Rebecca, Piper, Lauren, and me got up and went to meet Emmeline at the front. We saw her by the double doors with Marlene McKinnon and Susan Bones and walked over. "Hi," I said, giving Marlene and Susan quick hugs. "Ready to go?"

We flocked out the doors (And yes, I said "flocked". There were eight of us; what do you expect?) and walked down to the village, giggling and trading detention stories. We reached the main gates at about the same time as the Marauders.

"Hey Lily," James said, winking at the others and saving a smile for me. I felt the corners of my mouth lift up against my will and I heard my mouth say,

"Hi James. Planning on buying something to help you blow up the school?" Inwardly I cursed myself. I was coming dangerously close to flirting with him—_again_. I could practically feel Alice's gaze upon me.

"Of course," he said, grinning wickedly and falling into step next to me. "You look nice today."

I looked down at my knee-length skirt and fingered my matching headband, wondering what to say. I finally resorted to a simple, "Thank you."

"Did you guys have fun last night?" he asked, nodding to the others.

"Oh, yeah. But not _all_ of them came over. Just Alice, Emmeline, and Rebecca," I said, following his nod with my eyes. "Marlene and Susan came with Emmeline this morning and Piper and Lauren had dates." Oh, great! I just made myself an opening. I gave myself a mental high-five and said, innocently enough, "Lauren had a horrible time out with Amos, apparently. She kept going on and on about wanting a nice, cute guy that would actually notice her."

I glanced up at his face and had to keep myself from scowling. The blank look on his face clearly told me that he hadn't any idea of why I had told him that. "Oh, that's too bad," he said, glancing over at Lauren.

"Yep. I told her that she'd find the lucky guy soon enough and he'd end up being _right outside _her doorstep." He still didn't get the hint. How could he not get the hint? I couldn't be any more obvious than that, could I? I ventured a glance at Lauren, who was now talking animatedly with Sirius.

"Hey Lily, where are we going first?" Alice said, turning so she _accidentally _came between James and I. He, being a perfect gentleman as always, moved over so she would fit without knocking everyone's elbows with her own. I pretended not to notice his disappointed expression.

"I don't know. The Three Broomsticks, maybe?" I said, not particularly caring.

"Emmeline was saying that we should go to Lester's first and then go and get a drink," Alice offered. "If she's going now, we should too."

"Okay. Fine with me," I said, guessing that Alice just wanted to talk to me about James.

"Good. Here, we turn down this road. See you later, James!" she called, dragging me over to the rest of our group.

"Bye. See you later, Lil," James said, nodding to Alice and tousling my hair affectionately.

"Lily, I told you not to lead him on!" Alice said as soon as we were out of earshot. I glared at her.

"I didn't mean to," I said. "I never even noticed that we were flirting before!"

"Who's this now?" Marlene asked, falling back to walk with us.

"Oh, no one," I lied. "So, Marlene, I heard that you and Remus are going out!"

My diversion worked. For ten more minutes Alice and I were treated to another boy-obsessed talk like the one we'd just had at breakfast with Piper. As soon as Lauren stopped to look at something in the window, I yanked her over to walk with us.

"So Lauren, I might be able to get a date set up with you and James," I said as soon as Marlene stopped for breath. Lauren laughed and brushed her hair off her shoulder.

"You know what, Lily, I thought about it and I decided that I don't really like him that much any more."

I swear my jaw dropped off its hinges. "But this morning you said you did!" I practically cried. Lauren flushed.

"Well that was before Sirius asked me out," she said.

"Sirius asked you out?" Marlene cried. "Oh, you lucky thing! Was that just now?" I blanched.

"Wait. You said just now that you liked Remus! This is way too confusing for me," I said, rubbing my face with my hand.

"Well of course I like Remus. But Sirius…"

Damn! I thought, ignoring them as they—once again—began talking on and on about boys. Matchmaking Attempt Number One: Failure, I thought. Now I had to think of something **else **to make James forget about me.

I have a feeling that this is going to be a _long_ campaign.

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_So. That was kind of a girly chapter…sorry about that. I, at the very least, had fun with it._

_Thanks to all of you that reviewed last time, especially those with constructive criticism. BTW, I know that it was about the same length and still pretty predictable, but I'm trying my best to think of something. Also, thanks to EnlightenedKing for redoing my summary for me. I know the original one sucked and it actually didn't even summarize the story properly, so it was a relief when someone offered to do it._

_Anyway, the review thing still stands. If I don't get any, I won't post. Seriously, guys, I don't want to write if no one's reading this. So **PLEASE** tell me what you thought._


	5. The Pact

**Chapter Five: The Pact**

OR

**The Mumblings and Grumblings of a Neglected Best Friend**

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**Sirius**

**(Not like I'm neglected, though, because who could forget about me? Exactly, point proven. Now, moving on.) **

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This year is shaping up to be the worst year _ever_.

I'm not even kidding. Ever since Prongs got that stupid Head Boy badge he's gone all high and mighty and STOPPED PULLING PRANKS. I know—it's crazy to even _think _of such a thing! A marauding Gryffindor, losing his touch? I never thought the day would come. But it has. And it's not pretty.

Take his library habits, for instance. Prongs never even used to _step_ into the library—he never had to. In fact, we didn't find out where it _was_ until the middle of third year when we were tracking down a girl Wormtail liked in order to get her to go out with him (unfortunately, that plan fell through—apparently Marlene McKinnon was seeing Amos Diggory at the time). The point is, we've only been here for, what, a month, and Prongs has been in there at least twice a week. And yes, I just said it: TWO TIMES A WEEK! Maybe Moony would do that, but never James. Not our Prongs.

And that's not the end of it—not even the _worst _of it. You see, he's stopped pulling pranks as well. Yes, I know I already mentioned this, but believe me, it's horribly upsetting. Just the other day Snape was all on his own in the Potions corridor, an absolutely _perfect _opportunity, but as soon as I drew my wand, Prongs told me to put it away and ignore him. Of course, I was so busy goggling at him in disbelief that I didn't notice until too late that Snape had gone, disappeared, "poof"-ed. And _then_, when I asked Prongs what the _hell_ was the matter with him, he just shook his head and muttered something about it not being worth it. I ask you! What's NOT worth seeing Snape with pink horns popping out of his greasy hair? Then again, now that I think about it that _does _sound rather disgusting.

Later, when I was talking to Moony about it and asking whether he knew the symptoms of one possessed, Moony introduced me to an incredibly disturbing thought: What if Prongs was actually _growing_ _up_? Merlin forbid _that!_

The point is that something has to be done. And I know exactly what—we have to GET RID OF THE HEAD GIRL. Because Lily-bloody-Evans, rule-abider extraordinaire (which, by the way, is NOT a compliment), Hogwarts' worst prude, has somehow corrupted him. I knew that he had a _thing _for her, of course, because why else would he waste so much time moping all these years? I just never thought it would be this serious. You see, he's acting like a total nerd. Yes, you heard me. A nerd. One cannot be capable of marauding and a nerd. It just can't be done! I mean, the LIBRARY? Stopping PRANKS?

It won't be an easy job, though, getting rid of Lily. Since this year started she's started warming up to Prongs, even to the point of spending time with him outside of Head duties (which, coincidentally, has interfered directly with Marauder time). I still don't know exactly what to do. If we somehow changed her opinion of Prongs again, it would be a losing situation from any and every perspective, because even if Lily stopped hanging out with Prongs, he'd be too angry with us to come back to the Marauders. And if we tried to get Prongs to not like her anymore…let's just say that's probably not going to be an option.

You might think that I'm being a little selfish, but I need to make one thing clear: Lily Evans will NEVER like Prongs. Ever. It's like…a rule. Prongs loves Lily, Lily hates Prongs. (Let's just pretend that the rule hasn't been broken already since she likes him as a friend right now). The point is, if Prongs keeps going after her he's going to get his heart broken. I don't want my best friend to have to deal with that. And since it's a waste of time anyway, he should be with his friends, living his life to the fullest. He's never allowed a girl to get in our way before, and this shouldn't be any different. After all, it's only Lily. I still don't know what's so special about her to make him drop everything and change if it will mean she'll like him.

"Padfoot, pass me the frogspawn. And start paying attention—Slughorn will give us detention if you blow up another cauldron." I took the liberty of glaring at Remus.

"It's your fault for picking me as a partner," I said snottily as I popped a piece of bubble gum in my mouth. Remus rolled his eyes.

"Well I thought we would actually get something _done_," he said. "You used to be good at Potions."

I rolled my eyes. "Come on, Remus, give me some credit. I _am _good at Potions. I just sometimes get temporarily sidetracked from the assignment because I feel like blowing something up. Plus—" I added, popping another piece of gum in my mouth, "I know all the _wrong_ ingredients to put in potions – like, say, don't _ever _put unicorn hairs in a potion that already has ground up flobberworms in it; the explosion is huge and covers you with slime that glows in the dark for a week."

Remus stared at me for a long time without blinking. "Should I go switch with Wormtail?" I took the continuation of the stare as assent.

Thirty minutes later, James, too, was pushing me away from our desk, which had started giving off acrid purple fumes. "Padfoot, you idiot!" he groaned, coughing and sputtering as he tried to protect his face with his hands. "I _told _you to wait until I had added the roots before you poured in the dragon-tooth powder!"

"Well, I figured since they'd specifically mentioned four times _not _to do what I did it had to be something useful!" I answered reasonably. Unlike Prongs, I'd been the smart one to conjure up a Muggle gas mask right before the smoke started billowing in our faces. After a few fascinating seconds of watching Prongs' face turn purple (the same shade of the fumes, interestingly enough) I Banished the smoke and dusted off my hands calmly and surveyed the damage. Half of the class had purple faces, although none so much as James, and the contents of our cauldron (which used to be an Everlasting Potion for keeping fruits fresh) were bubbling and eating away at the metal.

"Black!" Slughorn growled, wiping at his face in a futile attempt to return his skin to the normal shade of puce. I smiled innocently at him.

"I'm very sorry, Professor—" A sly grin replaced the innocent one. "—but hey, at least we know what happens when—"

"Detention! For you _and _for Mr. Potter!" Slughorn interrupted, his jowls wobbling a bit as he walked forward, no doubt intending to sound intimidating. I choked on a laugh, earning a punch from James and a reproving look from Remus.

And you know what the worst part was? When we were walking out of the classroom, all James could say was, "Thanks a bunch, Padfoot – did you even _see _Lily's face? She's not going to talk to me for a week now."

Pathetic.

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"Hey, did you know that an octopus – you know, the Muggle water creature with eight legs and suckers – is less dangerous than a niffler?" I commented interestedly to no one in particular.

"No, Padfoot," Prongs said, sounding bored. "Shut up."

I did. For a moment, at least.

"Hey Wormtail – I read that magical rats are ten times more likely to survive in the wild than regular rats."

"Thanks, Padfoot," Wormtail groused. "Glad you care so much about my personal well-being that you've taken to researching me. Now shut up."

Wow. Two "shut up's" in forty seconds! That had to be a record. Now for Remus.

"Moony, when sheep can't go to sleep, what do they count?"

"Why would I know? Why would I _want _to know?" Remus mumbled, flipping a page in his Defense book. "Shut up."

Three! I sighed audibly. "It's a sad thing," I began in an exaggeratedly upset voice, "When your best mates don't even bother to listen to you. You'd think, wouldn't you, that a man's best friends would stick with them through thick and thin, bad days and good, joy and loss, heartache and heartbreak—"

"Shall you perform the silencing charm or shall I?"

"_Silencio_!"

…

I can _not_ believe that they just did that to me. A SILENCING charm? How uncreative is that? They could have done…well…anything, but _no_. They had to _silence _me.

Damn.

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Lily Evans is officially my hero.

Forget all that stuff I said about her earlier. She's an angel; a gorgeous, sexy goddess. I finally know why Prongs has liked her for all these years. She's not a bitch, she's not a thief, she's not a prude, or a rule-abider, or a—

"Black, start paying attention. You're distracting me," Lily snapped.

Never mind. She's still a prude. "Sorry Evans," I said, rolling my eyes. "Anyone would think that you were in love with the professor or something."

"You know, I'm starting to understand why James and Remus hexed you."

"Gee, thanks," I said sarcastically, aiming a quill up to the ceiling and letting it fly so it stuck at a directly vertical angle.

"Stop it. Do you want the professor to come over here?"

"Whatever." I flicked another one up, trying to aim it to the same spot. It missed.

"Really, Black. I'm Head Girl – so _stop_."

"Whatever." I aimed a third quill at the ceiling. _Bingo_! It hit the same point as the first one.

"Come on, Black. I wanted to ask you something about James."

"Whatev—James?" I turned sharply to look at her. Never, _ever _in my life have I had Lily Evans come up to me and say, "I want to talk about James." She usually left the complaining to her friends, and, frankly, I didn't want to be the one to have to listen to her ramble on about how irresponsible the two of us were in Potions this morning.

"Yes, James," she said coolly, facing me with an amused grin that didn't entirely hide her anxiety. My eyes narrowed—she didn't like him, did she? Somehow that sounded much more frightening than her lecturing me about him.

"Listen, Evans," I said, staring at her calculatingly, my quill-flicking mood vanishing. "Please, _please_ don't tell me that you like him." I told myself that my frustration was based on my wanting James' heart to be left intact rather than my own personal needs. Which it was, of course.

She looked shocked. "You think I LIKE him?" she yelped. I shrugged. "Listen, Black, I may have realized that James isn't half bad—as a _friend_, mind—but that doesn't mean I'm going to fall on my knees in front of him like all those other girls. You should know me better than that."

"Oh good," I said, letting out a relieved sigh. She glared at me again.

"_Anyway_," she said, rolling her eyes and taking a deep breath. "Do you think James still likes me?"

I choked on my piece of bubble gum and let out a short burst of laughter that happened to leave my mouth right as the professor paused in her lecture. "Carry on," I said idly, shooing away the glares my classmates were giving me. "I thought you were supposed to be smart, Evans," I said as soon as the class turned around. "That's like asking if Hogwarts was built by three founders."

She gave me a weird look. "It was built by four."

"Whatever," I said, popping a bubble and leaning back in my chair while propping my arms at the back of my head. "I bet Slytherin skived off most of the work anyway. But the point is that it's an obvious answer. _Everyone _knows that James Potter likes Lily Evans."

She looked away, biting her bottom lip and seeming to be on the verge of saying something. I looked at her appraisingly, knowing there had to be a reason why she had asked me that.

"The thing is…" she said slowly, still not meeting my gaze. "I don't think I'll ever like him in that way. And…" she broke off for a second before finally facing me with an embarrassed expression. "I don't want to hurt him or anything, but I want him to move on."

I stared at her. My jaw must have been wide open, but I didn't really care at the moment. "What are you saying?"

"I need your help."

"You—you mean—," I stuttered, hardly grasping that she was telling me she wanted to do the very thing I was agonizing over a while ago.

"Yes," she said, crossing her arms across her chest. Dimly I heard the professor droning on about the vastness and unpredictability of the universe, but my mind was swirling with the possibilities of what Lily was saying. James would hate me, I was sure, but then again he would get over it, and when he did the pranks would restart, we wouldn't be going to the library all the time, do homework, study… the Marauders could be _a humus of quattour _again.

"What did you have in mind?"

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"Who did the counter-spell?"

I didn't bother to glare at Remus, who was propping his book against his pillow in the boys' dormitory. "Lily did," I said happily. _Let the acting begin_…

"Well, of course. You guys just had Astronomy together, right?" Peter said, coming out of the bathroom with a towel around his neck and wearing only a pair of pink and yellow spotted boxers.

"Gross, Peter, go put some trousers on," I said, wrinkling my nose.

"You and Lily have Astronomy together?" Remus said, looking up in surprise. "You never told me that."

"You were always around Prongs and he would just start moping," I said, rolling my eyes.

"Not like he has to be jealous of you and Evans," Peter said with a laugh that sounded way too close to a giggle to be normal. I remained silent and plastered a guilty expression on my face, hoping Remus would catch it. He did.

"Padfoot…" Remus said, setting down his book and looking up, sounding alarmed. "What did you do?"

"Well, you saw what she was wearing today!" I cried in self defense, throwing my arms in the air. Moony and Wormtail stared at me in horror.

"James is going to kill you," Moony said matter-of-factly after a long pause.

"Why am I going to kill Padfoot?"

The three of us looked up in horror (well, I was only acting) as James entered the dorm in his Quiddich gear.

"Oh shit."

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_So, I know it's short. And I know it's taken me a long time, and you guys deserve a lot more. But I'm not finding that I have a lot of motivation to write at the moment, at least for this story, so this is how it's going to be for this chapter._

_On a happier note, I've drawn the outline for the rest of the story, and I've decided that it'll run about eleven to twelve chapters. In the next chapter, we'll see what Lily and Sirius are REALLY planning to do and how James is going to react. _

_So yeah, the only thing I have to say is thank you for all you people that reviewed and stuck with the story. And for all of you that haven't yet, I'd **love **to hear from you!!_


	6. Broken Code

**The Head Boy**

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**Chapter Six: Broken Code**

**James**

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People are always telling me to make use of my youth, because in no time at all I'll be regretting having missed all the fun in life. This is perhaps the only piece of advice I have ever taken from an adult figure of consequence, minus Dumbledore but including my parents. And naturally when I take people's advice I've got to do it to the fullest extent. Right?

At least, that's the excuse I gave McGonagall when she caught me twenty minutes ago working on the "surprise" I put in the Slytherin locker room after Quiddich training. Unfortunately, it didn't work half as well as I'd hoped, instead earning me a week of detention and a full lecture on Head Boy responsibilities. Too bad she was in a bad mood today, otherwise I probably could have talked my way out of it.

When I finally made it to Gryffindor Tower (to which I had gone instead of the Heads' Dormitories so I could recount the tale of my righteous endeavor to the rest of my comrades in insubordination), I found them already engrossed in what seemed to be a thrilling tale that Padfoot was telling. I opened the door just in time to hear Remus say, "James is going to kill you."

Morbidly curious now, I quirked an eyebrow and said, "Why am I going to kill Padfoot?"

Sirius nearly toppled off the bed. When he turned around his face was guilt-ridden and nervous. This couldn't be good.

"What did you do?" I said, dropping my broomstick in my trunk and reaching for a new school robe to replace my mangy Quiddich gear. Even though I made sure to keep a cool expression I was apprehensive of his answer. Had he taken a girl to Hogsmeade and accidentally burned my Invisibility Cloak? Did he inform the Hufflepuffs – whom we all know can't keep a secret to save their lives – of the location of the Room of Requirement? What if it was something even more serious, like that time he told Snape to go down to the Womping Willow?

"Well?" I prompted when he didn't reply, merely looked at the other two anxiously as if looking for backup. Honestly, if he didn't speak soon I think my mind could explode with the tension of leaping possibilities.

"All right, see here, Prongs. It wasn't my fault—" Sirius began, but then Remus cut him off with a roll of his eyes.

"Come off it, Sirius, and stop acting. Number one, it is your fault; and number two, Prongs doesn't want or need to hear about your escapade with Marlene McKinnon in the first place," he said matter-of-factly. Sirius' head whipped around to face Remus, whose expression was one of complete condemnation.

"Why would I be mad about Marlene McKinnon?" I questioned, thoroughly bewildered now, not only by Remus' words and the expression on Padfoot's face. I might have expected him to be mad for him giving him away or happy that he'd made the situation sound better somehow (although I'm sure that's about to change with the next words out of their mouths), but instead he seemed almost…disappointed. I pushed the thought away and raised me eyebrows, waiting for an answer.

"He was just telling us how Peeves landed the Invisibility Cloak from his date with McKinnon and made him chase him around the castle for an hour before he managed to get it back," Remus supplied. I turned to Padfoot, who now looked perplexed.

"Are you that stupid!" I said, my words coming out in a half-hearted scold instead of a full-blown shout. "He could have done anything with that, you arse."

"Sorry," Sirius mumbled. I had to bite back a frown – normally Padfoot would have laughed and joked around, and after being mad for about two minutes everything would be back to normal again. Only he was being serious and wasn't finding any humor in the situation. What's more, he looked confused. What was going on? I wondered.

"But I thought—" Peter began, his eyes flashing back and forth between Remus and Padfoot before Remus silenced him with a look.

"Prongs doesn't care. Shut it or we'll get into a real argument," he advised, and Peter closed his mouth, still looking uncertain.

"Oh no, I care," I corrected quickly, not wanting them to get the fact mixed up. "I don't want you lot mucking around with that thing and getting it lost."

"Then why aren't you mad?"

I turned to Padfoot and crossed my arms. "Why, do you want me to be?"

He grinned then, that mischievous smile that always came out when he was up to something. There, I thought, relieved. At least he's normal again for now.

"Nah," he said, waving his arms as if batting away a bird. "But seriously – why aren't you throwing nasty jinxes at me or something?"

"Can't hex you. I'm taking it easy with that kind of thing, remember?" I reminded him, conveniently forgetting about the situation less than thirty minutes ago with McGonagall. Best not to mention those things anyway. "Plus," I added as an afterthought, pulling a jumper over me head. "I've got to go meet Lily in the library for Heads stuff. Can't show up looking like I've been in a fight, now, can I?"

Something darkened in Padfoot's eyes, but before I could really look closer it was gone. "Oh. Right," he said coolly. "Evans."

I frowned. What was wrong with him? He had been all disappointed two minutes ago, then jesting, and now he was indifferent? He was like a girl with PMS. "Yeah, what's wrong with that?" I said, my voice unknowingly catching a defensive tone.

"Nothing. I just thought that we were going to Hogsmeade tonight," he said apathetically, and Peter nodded eagerly. Remus just looked on.

"Oh. I forgot," I said, wincing but shrugging my bag over my shoulders anyway. "Better luck next time, right?"

As I was walking through the door, I could have sworn I heard Padfoot mutter, "This had BETTER work," but when I turned around again he was digging under his bed for something. Shrugging my shoulders, I continued on with a slight bounce in my step that would never normally be there if it had meant I was only walking towards responsibility. As such, I couldn't see Padfoot pull my Invisibility Cloak out from my trunk where I had safely put it there four days ago.

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I'm beginning to think that something's wrong with me, like I've been seeing things or something. I mean, has Sirius always been so brooding? And what is with this thing where all of the sudden he's barely ever around anymore, always off "hanging out with some girl", as he vaguely describes it. Hell, even Remus is out of it. Lately he's taken to shooting glances at everyone around him (well, not everyone really – just me, Padfoot, and Lily) almost as though he expects something to explode. And as for Peter…well, Peter's pretty much normal, except he seems a little bit more nervous and unsure of himself whenever all four of us are together.

Even Lily's been acting strange. We used to hang around and talk outside of class, but now it's almost like she's avoiding me. Whenever I see her in the halls (which is rare, let me tell you), she just offers me this nervous smile and ducks away with her friends before I can talk to her. Once I saw her and Padfoot coming out of Astronomy together seemingly involved in a heated conversation but as soon as they saw me they stopped talking and Lily practically ran into the girls' bathroom.

It's driving me bloody bonkers.

I finally managed to corner Peter the other day, figuring that he would be the one most likely to talk.

"Hey, Pete," I said, coming up to him in Potions, the selfsame class in which I had made a complete ass out of myself the other day – or rather, Sirius had. "Be my partner?"

He looked decidedly uncomfortable, almost as though he knew what I was doing. "Oh—er…" he stumbled, glancing around feverishly to try and find someone to help him out of the situation. Seeing nothing, he deflated, and sighed. "All right."

"Excellent!" I exclaimed, clapping him on the back and practically shoving him into the desk across the classroom from where Moony and Padfoot had sat. As soon as the class began to brew the potion Slughorn had written on the board, I turned to Wormtail, who was determinedly avoiding my gaze as he flipped through his Potions textbook in an attempt to find the list of ingredients. "Page four-hundred and sixty," I said offhandedly before I began dicing the newt's eyes.

"So!" I said brightly after a grand total of sixty seconds in which Wormtail began sweating profusely, and probably not from the cauldron. "What's up with you and Remus and Sirius?"

"Er, nothing much," Wormtail managed, his voice coming out in a squeak. I smirked and shook my head, abandoning my practice of chopping up the eyes.

"Now, now, now, Wormtail, did we teach you nothing about lying?" I teased. "Come off it and tell me what's going on. What do you lot know about that I don't?"

"I don't even know so don't ask me!" Peter said somewhat shrilly, and to my disappointment I could tell he wasn't lying.

"Well, do you know anything?" I said, picking the knife back up and scraping the eyes into the boiling water, careful to stir three times.

"No," he said quickly.

"Come on, you can tell me," I persisted, my eyes lighting up. "I won't tell anyone – come on…"

Wormtail cast a fast glance in Sirius' direction, and just as I turned my head I managed to catch Padfoot give his head the tiniest of shakes. "It's about Snape," he let out in a rush, avoiding both Sirius's and my eyes.

"Snape?" I said, surprised. Why would they have to hide something from me about _Snape_? I narrowed my eyes suspiciously at Wormtail's bent figure. "Snape? What about Snape?"

"Well, Padfoot pulled a prank on him the other day while you were gone and we didn't tell you because you'd either be mad that we didn't tell you or mad that we did it in the first place," said Wormtail. I narrowed my eyes. He was still lying, I knew it. But then again, it didn't seem like he was going to tell me the truth any time soon. I would have to find another approach.

"All right," I conceded. He looked up at me in shock. "What?" I said. "I know when someone's telling the truth. Pass the powdered armadillo skin, please."

Wormtail squirmed a bit in his seat at my words, no doubt twisting my "I know when someone's telling the truth" guiltily in my head. I hadn't been lying – it was just that I knew he_ wasn't_ telling the truth. He passed me the powder wordlessly, and we passed the next twenty minutes in silence, working quietly to finish the potion.

After we had handed it in to Slughorn and received our homework assignment, I remembered something and remarked, "Say, Wormtail, you don't happen to know what's up with Lily lately, do you?"

Was it my imagination, or did he look distinctly uncomfortable?

"Er…no," he squeaked, then suddenly scampered off on a mysterious mission that involved vanishing completely from my sight. I sighed and scanned the classroom. Almost everyone had finished now, apart from Sirius and Remus, who seemed to have conducted another "experiment" (or at least, Sirius had) and were now dealing with cleaning up the mess, and then Lestrange and Nott, who probably had about three brain cells between them. My gaze fell on Lily, who was sitting near the front with Alice and was chatting happily.

She looks pretty today, I thought. Not like she didn't look pretty all the time, mind. But today she was wearing a different sort of robes, robes that seemed to curve around her figure in a way none of the universal black robes people normally wore did. She was also wearing her hair down, a rare display that she hardly ever made, seeing as her hair was more often than not tied at the back of her head in a neat bun. Seeing that she wasn't really getting much work done anyway, I crossed the classroom and came up behind her and Alice's chair.

"So then, he was like, 'I don't know, you look really pretty for being up at six o'clock in the morning'!" Alice was squealing, twisted around in her seat so she could see Lily's face better and bouncing in her chair.

"Oh, that's _so _cute!" Lily squealed back. "Oh my gosh, do you think he's going to ask—"

Alice suddenly became aware that I was right behind them and elbowed Lily to make her shut up. "Wha—oh!" Lily said, blushing prettily and pushing a strand of hair away from her face. "Hi, James," she said.

"Hey," I grinned, leaning back on the vacant desk behind me. "So what's up? I haven't talked to you for a while."

Was it just me, or did she look rather nervous? Lily hadn't been nervous around me in a long time – I wondered if that was a bad thing.

"Yeah, I'm sorry about that," she said, pushing another hair back from her face and biting her lip. Yup, she definitely was. "I've just been really busy."

"Too busy for your favorite Head Boy?" I mocked, pushing her lightly on the shoulder. She smiled, her eyes sparkling.

"Favorite Head Boy? You're the only Head Boy!" she laughed. Despite her seeming lightheartedness, she kept flicking glances over to Alice, whose expression remained grim. "But yes, I'm too busy for even you."

"Ah…I'll get over it," I sighed teasingly. "Besides, we have patrols tonight. You can make it up for me there."

There was no denying it now; her expression was distinctly uncomfortable. "Of course. Yes. I almost forgot about that," she mumbled to herself. She looked up again and caught my raised eyebrow. The corners of her mouth turned up as though involuntarily and she added, "Yes, I'll be there. And you're right, we should hang out soon, especially now that we're friends."

Even I didn't fail to grasp the hidden warning. _Especially now that we're friends_, she said. My chest constricted slightly as I took in what she was saying. It seemed like she didn't want to be anything more, then. Shoving my gloom aside for the moment, I rumpled a hand through her hair, making her unconsciously smooth it and blush, and walked away, calling an "I expect to see you there, Evans," over my shoulder. I plopped back down in my seat, feeling oddly forlorn. Maybe everyone was right – maybe she didn't like me and wouldn't ever.

A few minutes later, I noticed Sirius get up out of his seat and lean over to talk to Lily. I kept my eyes on them for a moment, bewildered. Since when has Padfoot said more than two words to Lily without my being there? I felt an odd hole in my stomach sink even farther when I saw her smile at something he said.

This is stupid, I thought to myself. It's _Padfoot_. Your best friend, _Padfoot_. If anyone were going to make a move on her, he would be the last one. Still, I couldn't keep the awful feeling of premonition for the rest of the period. Only after the bell rang, when I risked one last glance back over to Lily and saw that she was sneaking looks in my direction, did I begin to lighten up again. Maybe she felt something towards me.

One can always hope, right?

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"Oy, Padfoot, pass the potatoes," said Wormtail, who had miraculously reappeared when dinnertime had arrived. Sirius grabbed the potatoes and dumped them in front of Peter's plate unceremoniously, scowling rather darkly as he did.

"What's the stick up your arse?" I said merrily as I poured myself some more pumpkin juice. Padfoot rolled his eyes and continued pushing his fork around his plate. Remus kept looking back and forth between the two of us. I heaved a sigh of exasperation. "Come on, Moony, what's really going on? I know something's up with you guys. Tell me what it is."

"Sna—"

I wagged a finger at Remus and grinned tauntingly. "Nuh-uh, but nice try. Wormtail already tried to sell me on that one."

Padfoot and Moony exchanged a glance. "What are you talking about?" Padfoot said. He looked genuinely confused, although we all know how good he is at faking his emotions. "We did do something to Snivellus."

I was sure that that wasn't the only problem, but I kept quiet. How would something that had to do with Snape effect the others' moods, anyway? "Okay, whatever. Do you guys know what's up with Lily then?" Remus and Peter both stiffened, making me immediately suspicious, but Padfoot appeared unfazed.

"What? Is she different?" he inquired lightly. "I hadn't noticed anyway."

That reminded me.

"Padfoot, since when were you and Lily all chummy?" I said. "I thought you hated her."

"I didn't hate her," he corrected. "Just…disliked. She's a prude, you know."

"No she's not!" I defended. "Honestly, you guys don't know her like I do. She's got a really good sense of humor when she wants to and she's really clever—"

"That doesn't mean she's not a prude," Padfoot interrupted, a hint of a smile on his face. "Anyway, I didn't mean it in a bad way. We just never hung around her before."

"Oh. Yeah," I said, slightly self-conscious for having reacted like that. "But she really isn't like that. She just wants to keep her good reputation."

"Do you really like her then?" Moony said casually. I had a feeling that it wasn't just a passing question though.

"Yeah, I do," I sighed. "I've tried not to, you know, because she would always shut me down but it's just like…this force or something. I mean, I'll see her in class smiling and I just want to do things to make her _stay _like that, so happy, you know? And she's always so pretty and nice to all the younger years. I haven't once seen her be mean to even a Slytherin and–" I cut myself off, embarrassed. "But yeah, not like I've thought about it a lot or anything."

Moony and Wormtail rolled their eyes and laughed, but Padfoot just looked troubled. He didn't speak that much for the rest of dinner and we went back up to Gryffindor Tower for some chess he was uncharacteristically subdued. I pushed away the feeling that something might be wrong. Nothing ever stayed different between the four of us for long, anyhow, so how should this be any different?

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Several hours later, I found myself waiting by the entrance to the Heads' Dormitories, tapping my foot a bit and examining the brick wall across the corridor. I had been sure earlier in the year that there was another secret passageway here, but so far I hadn't found a way to open it. I glanced at my watch and flicked my eyes back to the entrance. Where was she? It wasn't like Lily to be late, let alone be late for a duty entrusted upon her by Dumbledore. A loud _slam _caught my attention as she came tumbling out of the entrance, her hair mussed and her eyes frantic as she looked around for me. When she finally saw me, she breathed a sign of relief and ran forward, tugging on her black shoes as she did.

"I am _so _sorry," she said breathlessly when she reached me. She leaned onto the wall next to me and attempted to pull the shoes fully over her heels. "First I was doing that Charms essay due tomorrow, then I remembered that I have about five books due at the library, and then I came across this old scrapbook and I started flipping—"

"Don't worry about it," I interrupted, flashing her a grin. She stopped talking and raised an eyebrow at me. "Everyone's allowed to be late occasionally." She smiled gratefully at me and fell into step next to me, opening classroom doors as we passed through the third-floor corridor.

"No, but I really am sorry," she added. "I'm not normally late, am I? I feel so bad to have kept you waiting, especially when I specifically told you earlier that I would be here."

"Nah. You showed up," I said easily, yanking open a broom cupboard to reveal two first year boys that had no doubt hidden as soon as they heard voices. "Five points each from Hufflepuff," I said lightly, glancing at the colors of their scarves. "Next time hide somewhere better. I suggest the secret passageway just behind the knight over there." I pointed and gave them a small push, grinning as Lily added, using a considerably stricter tone,

"Right, off to your common rooms now. Don't let us catch you again or it'll be ten each."

"Anyway, as I was saying," I resumed. "What's been up with you lately, Lily? We really haven't talked that much recently."

She looked the tiniest bit guilty as she closed an open window above a portrait of a playing orchestra. "Yeah, I know. I'm sorry," she said. "Nothing's really been going on, though…just the usual classes, homework, and sleep. I must live the most boring life in this whole school."

I grinned mischievously. "Yeah, but better than what some other people have got. I mean, did you hear that rumor about Benjamin Summers and—"

"Marlene McKinnon, I know," Lily interrupted, allowing a frown to cross her face. "Gosh, that's so sad! I mean, I always thought Benji was this really nice guy and then she had to go drop that on him – or his brother, at least."

"Wait, what are you talking about?" I said, genuinely confused. "I thought that _he _cheated on _her_ and she dumped him when she found out that he got some Muggle woman pregnant!"

She stared at me, bewildered, then burst into peals of giggles. I smiled slightly just looking at her. She was always so pretty when she was smiling or laughing. "I guess we never know what's really true, then," she chuckled. "Only now I really want to know what other rumors are out there. Too bad Marlene and I aren't friends, otherwise I could ask her and not be looked at like some huge gossiper."

I had to stifle a laugh at her words and managed to merely raise an eyebrow. "Aren't you sort of gossiping right now?"

She looked a bit guilty. "Oh yeah," she said, looking around as though to see if anyone had heard us. "I should stop. Poor Ben and Marlene; I bet they just got in an argument and people are making up big stories."

I laughed and opened the door to Flitwick's main classroom at the same classroom. Empty. "Remember what they used to say about us?"

She went red with the memories, but I just kept grinning. "Of course," she mumbled, her face now matching her hair. "Now are you referring to the arranged marriage story or the rape?"

"Oh! I forgot about those," I exclaimed happily, though she merely groaned. "I was just remembering how people thought that you were really Muggle royalty and the only reason I wanted to date you was so I could become some Muggle ruler and take over both the magical and non-magical worlds."

"Ugh," Lily grimaced, although a hint of a smile remained in her eyes. "I forgot about that one."

The rest of the next hour passed pretty much like that. It seemed that my relationship with Lily was the same as ever, but there were a few times that I thought it sounded like she was drawing away from me again and becoming a bit distant, and she didn't flirt with me at all. Either which way, we were having fun up until about ten o'clock, when we decided to pop down to the kitchens for a quick snack before finishing off the night in the Astronomy Tower.

Just as we rounded the corridor before we came to the portrait of the fruit bowl, Sirius came around it holding a plate full of pastries and pudding. "Oops," he said, stopping dead when he realized that he was an hour past curfew and the two Head students had caught him.

"Oops is right," Lily said, grabbing the lone bunch of grapes off of the plate and popping one in her mouth. "Lucky you have food, otherwise we'd have to take points off."

I stared at her in surprise. Since when had they become chummy? I remembered with a pang that Sirius had talked to her in Potions this morning and she seemed to enjoy his company.

"What are you even doing here, Padfoot?" I said, shoving my feelings aside for the moment. "I thought you guys were—" I stopped talking suddenly, casting a sideways glance at Lily to see if she noticed the slip-up.

She rolled her eyes. "Going to sneak to Hogsmeade?" she supplied, a trace of a grin on her lips. I held back my surprise. She wasn't mad? And how had she guessed right anyway? "But anyway, Sirius, I need to talk to you about that – erm – Astronomy paper we have due next class." She gave him a significant look, one that I didn't fail to see.

"Oh yeah, you guys have that class together," I observed, slightly suspicious of their deliberately innocent expressions. Lily threw me a pleading smile.

"Yes. James, can you go get me some more grapes from the kitchens? Sirius only got a little bit. Then we'll be done when you come back," she said, pouting her lips in a decidedly endearing pout. I heaved a sigh. No way could I resist _that _look.

"All right. Wait for me and I'll be back in a tick," I said, turning the corner and tickling the pear on the fruit bowl. I noticed that as soon as I had gone Lily had pulled Padfoot into a rather secluded niche and was now speaking to him in urgent tones, but I decided to ignore it. They probably just didn't want to get caught – after all, Lily and I were allowed to be out, but Sirius wasn't.

It took another five minutes for me to choose what I wanted and find a bowl of purple grapes (don't ask me how I know Lily likes those more than the green) for the Head Girl. When I made my way back, my mouth full of cranberry croissant, my ears pricked to hear my name in the conversation between Padfoot and Lily. Surely I wasn't part of their project? I drew closer stealthily, telling myself I wasn't really eavesdropping because they'd known I'd be back in about five minutes.

"—you said you would, Sirius!" Lily was saying in a loud whisper. "Come on, you said you wanted—"

"I really don't think it's going to work anymore, Lily," Sirius interrupted, sounding abnormally grim. "James is my best friend; I'm not going to do this to him."

"What about your friendship! I thought you didn't want me ruining it!" Lily cut in again, sounding desperate.

"If I do this to him he's never going to forgive me. I don't understand girls, not really, but we have an unspoken code to never do things like that and I'd be breaking the code if I agreed. I know I already said I would, but I was being stupid. He doesn't deserve this, no matter how much you want him to forget."

"Listen, Sirius," Lily said, and it sounded as though she were about to dissolve into tears. "I really like James. I do! It's just that I don't see that ever evolving into anything other than platonic. He's nice and he's smart and he's responsible and mature now, but I just don't feel that way for him."

"So you planned to use me to make my best friend back down." Sirius's laugh, when it came out, made a harsh, grating sound that echoed softly in the hallway. "I don't even know why I agreed to this in the beginning, because it's sounding more and more stupid the farther it goes. Like he's going to just back down! He's going to curse my guts out when he finds out we're supposedly _dating_—"

_Thud_.

I dropped the food I was carrying, shocked and revolted. Lily and Sirius whipped around, expressions of horror twisting their faces when they saw it was me. I couldn't even think straight anymore – what had they just said? Gradually my mind began to process the information, and the sickening pit in my stomach gave way to a hard, bitter anger. My best friend and the girl I was practically in love with? Even though it sounded like they never had gotten anywhere, I had heard enough make me feel as though this were the worst moment of my life.

"What?" I said finally, my voice dangerously low and miraculously calm. Even to my ears it sounded eerie. Lily and Sirius just looked terrified.

"Listen, James, let me explain—" Lily began helplessly, but I cut her off, more angry with her than I'd ever been.

"What, Evans, you want to say that it didn't mean anything?" I said nastily, though my voice remained almost scarily cool. She flinched when I said, "Evans". "You want to say that you've just been plotting with my _supposedly _best friend to try and make me—what, not like you anymore? Forget my silly little _crush_—" My voice rose steadily with the words I spoke, and pretty soon I found myself practically yelling as I rounded on Padfoot. My friend, Padfoot. The one who had never betrayed me.

"And _you_!" I snarled, my eyes practically lighting him on fire. "You _knew _I liked her! You knew that I did and yet you went on and–" I stopped and shook my head, disgusted. I didn't _want _to know the details. "You are the most selfish bastard I know," I said icily. "Why did you even do it? Bang a pretty witch and make me lose interest because _you _took the girl I liked before I did? You disgust me." I uttered the last sentence with cold finality, daring him to reply. But Sirius Black was Sirius Black no matter how many immoral decisions he made, and he never backed down from a fight.

"Oh yeah, Prongs?" he snapped back, looking furious. "Who's always griping about 'Evans this' and 'Evans that'? Who's neglected to spend any time with his friends since this _stupid _Head Boy position got in the way of everything? Who's the one who really betrayed his friend, tell me that?" I shook my head, at a loss. I could not BELIEVE what he was saying – did he honestly think he was right? "And maybe you didn't hear me," Padfoot – no, Black now – added in his final word. "_I _tried to back out of it. I knew you wouldn't like it, so I backed out when I realized that you genuinely liked her and weren't going to back down because of some stupid thing I did."

"That is completely beside the point," I retorted. "You shouldn't have done it in the first place. You _broke the code_." I turned away from them dismissively and started to stride back the Head Tower again. They deserved what they got, I told myself, ignoring the lump of guilt and misery in my throat. They deserved it.

"James!" Lily yelled from the end of the hallway, but I didn't turn around. I heard footsteps racing unevenly to catch up, and pretty soon her unsteady and shaky breath came from my right shoulder. "James, I'm sorry, just let me explain, okay?" She reached out and grabbed my arm to stop me.

I whipped around in fury, surprising her enough to make her almost fall. "Who the bloody hell do you think you are?" I said, my voice anything but cool or apathetic. Instead it was shaking with impossible amounts of emotion. "I never asked you to do anything. I wanted to be your friend. I didn't push you _once_!" She made a noise as though she were about to speak, but I cut her off again.

"Don't act like it's all my fault, Evans," I snarled. "_You _have led me on ever since that train ride!" I saw her eyes widen and then narrow again, and I knew I had struck a nerve.

I also knew that I was right.

"Is it so bad, to be liked by me?" My voice was losing its invincibility and cracking a bit now. "Is it so bad that you'd want to go behind my back and try and find my best friend because it was so terrible being liked by me? I don't know what I have to do to make you see, Lily, that this isn't some little thing. I don't like you just because you're pretty – I liked you because you were smart and funny and the only one that saw through the front I put up. I changed for you. I changed so maybe you would see that I'm not an arrogant bastard who only thinks about himself. And I thought—" My voice cracked again, and my tone was heavy now, my chest heaving. "I thought that maybe you would notice and at least give me a chance."

She looked stunned. But she didn't look sorry. I felt like throwing up then. I was standing here like a lunatic and having just confessed my everlasting love for the Ice Queen, and _she was just standing there._ I think it was then that it truly hit me – she didn't like me. Not at all. Not after anything I'd done for her, she didn't like me and would do anything just to make me leave her alone.

"I get it now," I said. I would have liked the words to come out cold and emotionless but I knew that wasn't the case. "I get it. I'm sorry for ever speaking to you, ever asking you out, ever trying to be someone that you could learn to depend on. I'll leave you alone now. I won't bother you anymore." And with that I turned around, not seeing her face fall, not hearing her try to move her mouth so words could come out, not listening to the silent plea that begged me to wait.

All I heard was silence.

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_Okay. Wow – it's been a while. This chapter was really hard to write…originally I had a completely different plotline set up, but they I started writing it and it didn't flow and when I thought about it the sequence of events was totally unrealistic. So I hope you liked the bit of drama I put in instead._

_Once again, sorry for the wait – I'm afraid I have next to no motivation for this fic anymore. Do you know that I got ZERO reviews for the last chapter? Isn't that terribly saddening? If you want to make my day, review this chapter or even go back and review the last one. Seriously, guys, if you do it and I get…oh, let's say **three **reviews…I'll have the next chapter out in a maximum of two weeks. Three reviews, guys. That's like nothing. No, it IS nothing._


	7. Mixed Feelings

**The Head Boy**

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**Chapter Seven: Mixed Feelings**

**Alice**

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Being Lily Evans's best friend isn't nearly as easy as it looks. Someone looking in from the outside may smile and say, "Oh, look at Alice. She's so lucky! I bet she's got top marks in all of her classes and hardly ever gets in trouble since she's the Head Girl's best friend." Then they might go on and on about how ALICE, otherwise known as ME, is probably just as amazing and clever and nice and dreadfully perfect as the Head Girl because Lily has to have rubbed off on me.

Well, that would be nice if it was true. But I'm afraid there are more things – considerably less beneficial, I might add – that they fail to recognize. What about those very public fights that used to take place between the Head Girl and her male counterpart? As utterly inconceivable as it sounds, someone always has to clean up the mess and either listen to Lily rant on for hours about how immature Potter is and how she'd like to castrate him and feed him to Hagrid's dogs (well, maybe I made that last part up), or stroke her hair and assure her that she isn't really a bitch or a prude or whatever he had called her as she sobs pitifully in my lap.

No, I definitely think they fail to grasp that part.

But, as I am Lily's best friend and am in no condition to give up the position, the more disagreeable duties still fall to me.

When our seventh year started, my overall excitement was tempered with dread when Lily told me who the Head Boy was. After six years of no break from their rows I had rather hoped that a seventh might be avoided, so obviously it was an incredible relief to me when I had found that she had come to a sort of truce with him. Only soon that truce led to more bantering, this time of the more flirtatious kind, which led many people (possibly even James) assuming that Lily had a _thing _for the Head Boy.

Which leads us to our current predicament.

You see, after I pointed out to Lily what she was doing, she realized that she had to stop before she hurt his feelings. Without telling me, she obtained the help of James's best friend, planning to pretend to date him in the hope that James would back off. What she hadn't counted on was Sirius deciding that James genuinely liked Lily and so refusing to come between her and his best friend.

Personally, I think it was the conclusion that he would be hexed into oblivion that caused him to back off, not the noble sentiment he expressed to Lily.

Things wouldn't have been that bad, then, if they had just ended it there and Lily had attempted a more harmless way of turning James off. But there was a slight problem.

You see, James overheard them.

Lily's in my room right now, sobbing about how she's such a terrible person and should never have gotten involved with James Potter, Hogwarts, or magic in general. I told her, quite nicely, that avoiding involvement with the above would have been rather difficult to achieve for any number of reasons, but only succeeded in making her cry even harder.

What confused me the most was why she was so worked up. If she didn't like him, why was this such a big deal? He had finally decided he'd had enough, and even though she'd lost a friend, things would just go back to normal – vicious battles by the lakeside and screaming matches in the halls, not to mention constant, constant _whining_.

…Never mind, I know why she's upset.

I patted Lily comfortingly on the head, pulling up the covers (of MY bed – see how good of a friend I am?) so they were snug around her chin. "It's okay, Lily. Let it all out," I said soothingly. She sniffled and shook her head, her now very red nose scrunched up in self-pity.

"No it's not," she said thickly, hands balled into fists to cover her puffy eyes. "He hates me."

"What did he say to you?" I said curiously. Although she had managed to give me the details of all the other events leading up to the confrontation, she had refused point blank to tell me what he had finally said to her. It must have been rather terrible for her to be in such a state now.

She shook her head again, burying her face in my pillow and probably wiping snot all over it. I made a mental note to clean it as soon as possible.

"I don't want to say."

"If you don't tell me you'll just keep thinking about it," I said, brushing her hair away from her shoulders. "Come on, Lily. I'm your best friend. I'm not going to judge you." I'm not denying that what she did was bad, but I wasn't going to tell her that when she was like this. Besides, I had to get that information out of her _somehow_.

There was a pause in Lily's sobs so that they were just sniffles against the pillow. I suddenly realised my roommates had probably awoken due to the immense racket we were making. I peeked around the hangings of my four-poster and was relieved to see that they had all somehow managed to stay asleep. I drew my wand out and cast a Silencing Charm around the bed anyway.

"He really liked me, Alice."

My forehead creased as I stared at Lily, who was avoiding my gaze. "What?" I said, lowering my voice so it came out in a soft, undemanding tone, hoping it didn't sound I was desperate to know what she meant…which I was.

She sniffled loudly and blew her nose. Then she propped herself up on her elbows and leaned forward to stare at the lump her feet made under the covers.

"He actually liked me," she said again, her voice soft and full of an emotion I couldn't identify.

"I know. We all knew. Didn't you?" I said.

She shook her head, a ragged strand of hair falling from her straggly ponytail. "I always thought…" She stopped, hesitating, before she continued. "I always thought that it was just a game to him. I never even considered that he might actually _feel _something for me."

I felt the pity rise in me. So she was feeling guilty, then.

"He was so sad, Alice," Lily said after a short pause. "He sounded so…defeated. Like I had just pushed him off a cliff and he didn't have the will to try and climb back up."

"What did he say?" I said softly.

She took a deep, shaky breath. "He…apologized," she said, almost as though she was confused. "He apologized for ever asking me out or even liking me. It was like he was seeing me for the first time, only instead of seeing something good he saw this…horrible, pathetic…" She trailed off, obviously at a loss for words. "I don't…I didn't…" She stopped talking again, tears leaking out of the corners of her eyes. "I'm so sorry, Alice. I didn't mean to hurt him."

I reached over and pulled her into a hug. "I'm sure he'll get over it," I said, trying to be reassuring but not so sure myself. She expelled a shaky laugh.

"No. I've hurt him so badly he's never going to want to talk to me again. And Sirius…" I could see a lump form in her throat as she looked away. "I just feel bad for dragging him into this."

"Tell me why you're really upset, Lily," I said, deciding to let that subject drop for the moment. If she had told me what she was planning to do with Sirius I would have _told _her it was a bad idea. But I didn't want to make her even more miserable right now so I didn't mention it. "Is it just because you feel bad about hurting him, or because of Sirius, or because of something else?"

She looked away again, looking distinctly uncomfortable. I waited patiently. If there was one thing I knew about Lily it was that she would tell me what she felt on her own time, not anyone else's.

"I suppose it's because of the way he did it," she said finally. "If it was me I would have been mean and bitter and called him a bunch of names and that would have been the end of it. But he didn't do that. He was going after Sirius like there was no tomorrow but when it came to me it was like…he couldn't. He started to, but then it was like he broke and he sounded so _sad_. Like he couldn't even help himself. And he looked…ashamed, like I'd made him sorry that he had ever felt anything for me because I just ended up hurting him. I can't even explain it, Alice. It was just like I betrayed him. Like I'd broken his arms, tied him up, and left him on the ground in the path of a rampaging dragon."

I had to bite back a smile at her last sentence. Trust Lily to come up with some strange metaphor at the least appropriate of times.

"Listen," I said, after I made sure my voice wouldn't give away my inner mirth. "It doesn't sound like there's anything you can do at the moment. You tried to apologize but he wasn't having it, so it's no use going back if you know he's not going to accept it. Just let it cool down for a few days and then try and go back to him."

I don't think she processed a word of what I said, because all she did was frown and sniffle again, then ask plaintively, "Alice, do you think that what I did was wrong?"

I hesitated. Of course I thought she was wrong. She should have come to me before she did anything so she wouldn't have ended up making such a big mess. But should I tell her? She was miserable already.

And then I thought of how James must feel and my resolve hardened. Yes, Lily was my best friend, but that didn't mean I had to think everything she did was right. It sounded like she hurt James almost beyond repair, and the least I could do was try and make the situation better – whether for him or her I wasn't sure yet. I took a deep breath.

"Yes, Lily, I do think you were wrong," I said, but not unkindly. Her face fell a bit but I knew that she had braced herself for this. "You should have realized that enlisting Sirius wasn't a good way to make James forget. You should have thought about it." I stopped and wrapped an arm around my best friend's shoulder. "But you know what, Lily? Don't worry about it. You can't do anything now so you might as well lift your head up and figure out how to apologize without making an arse out of yourself again."

And that was that for the night.

Until she started sobbing again, of course.

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I did eventually work out with Lily how to speak to James in an attempt to reconcile them, but by the time classes rolled around she was still much too upset to do it. So, naturally, I sent her off to see Sirius. Easier one done first, right?

Wrong.

Before classes started on Monday, Lily and I (for moral support only) went to the common room to wait for Sirius before he came down. He finally did around eight-twenty (a full hour after we'd shown up), but as soon as he saw her he immediately changed his course to grab something he'd "forgotten" in his dorm.

Yeah, right.

"Sirius!" Lily said quickly, vaulting off the couch to grab his arm before he could get away. He shook her off.

"Fuck off, Evans, haven't you already messed up my life enough?"

Lily stopped dead, her mouth moving like a goldfish. "_What_?" she finally sputtered.

"You heard me," he spat, grabbing her arm and flinging it off him. "I don't want you near me."

Lily's mouth clamped shut, her eyes performing a complete turnaround from remorse to absolute lividness. "_Excuse _me?" she yelped. "_I _didn't tell you to get involved; that was _your _choice! Sure I was wrong for even suggesting it in the first place but you didn't have to agree! Don't you _dare _lay all the blame on _me_ for this, Sirius Black!"

"You didn't even stop to think about it, did you, Evans?" he sneered. "All you thought about was your precious self. Does it make you happy, knowing that you broke his heart? Does it make you happy to know that you broke up a friendship of _seven fucking years_?"

Ooh, here come the fireworks.

But instead of breaking out into a furious screech to combat Black's remarks, Lily did something I never would have suspected. She took a deep breath and said, her voice flat, "I'm sorry. All right? That was all I wanted to say. I'm sorry for being selfish. I'm sorry that I didn't think before I started this whole mess, and I'm sorry for bringing you into this. But mostly I'm just sorry for hurting James. I was being an immature idiot, and I just hope that you and James will be able to forgive me."

Something flickered in Sirius's face then that I couldn't place. I knew he had to be shocked – who wouldn't be, seeing Lily Evans back down from a fight? – but something told me there was more to it. Regret, maybe, or even respect? Or maybe Sirius always went about looking as constipated as he did right now.

"Well, thanks," Sirius said coolly, not sounding at all sincere. I instantly regretted ever thinking that he looked sorry. "But James and I have worked it out."

I nearly fell over from my hidden position by the couch. James had forgiven him? Who in their right mind would forgive their _best mate _for doing something like that with the girl they were mad about? Black was going barmy.

"What?" Lily said, also sounding stunned.

Black lazily flicked a piece of lint off a passing first year's robe and let it drop in front of his eyes to float down to the ground. "Yep," he drawled, not sounding the least concerned. "Said you weren't worth it. Decided last night that he would get over you."

Yeah right. James Potter get over Lily Evans? No way. Besides, hadn't Black just said that she broke up a "friendship of seven (next word edited because of Black's appalling use of language) years"? At least he should make up his mind.

I could see Lily struggling for words. To my surprise, she seemed to deflate a bit when Black said that James had said she wasn't worth it. Almost like she was disappointed. But of course that couldn't be right.

"Oh. Well. I suppose —" Lily said, flustered now. "I suppose that's all I needed to say to you then. I didn't…mean to cause you any trouble. I'm glad that you and J—Potter sorted things out."

She turned around and walked away, tucking a strand of her bright hair behind her ear and studying the ground far too intently to be considered normal. As quick as her confirmation had been, however, I was nowhere near to being done. I strode up to Black and jabbed my finger into his chest. "What are you playing at, eh?" I said. His look of surprise turned to a scowl.

"I don't know what the hell you're talking about," he snapped, turning around and following Lily (unintentionally, I'm sure) out of the common room.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," I said, rolling my eyes. "Then how come you're so mad? I know as well as Lily _should_ know that you're normally not this serious."

Instead of making a stupid "Sirius—serious" pun like he normally would have, Black jammed his hands into his pockets and glared at me.

"Why the hell are you following me?"

"Because you're lying about something."

He stopped, surprised, then turned to look down at me, his eyes narrowed. "Lying about what?" he asked, and now I saw that he seemed genuinely curious, though still slightly angry.

I waved my arm vaguely. "Right, where do I start? First you want to avoid talking to Lily, then you blow up in her face looking madder than _I've_ ever seen you and are COMPLETELY unreasonable and say that everything's her fault, then you seem impressed at the fact that Lily apologized (which I was myself), and then you start contradicting yourself and saying really cold-hearted, mean things. I'm confused. Either you're bipolar, or you're lying. Take your pick."

His scowl was back in full force.

"Look, Evans did something really stupid. And Pron—James is really pissed off right now. So I would suggest that she doesn't go near him, all right?"

"Ah-ha!" I said, sounding annoying even to my own ears. "So now you say that James is mad? I thought you said before that he decided she wasn't worth it?"

Black looked frustrated—whether at himself or me I never found out. At that moment, Lily rounded the corner, saying, "Alice? I've been waiting for ages—"

Quicker than I could say "Marauder," Black had disappeared, seemingly into thin air but probably into one of those secret passageways castles like these always seem to have. I sighed before turning to Lily. "Hi."

"Hello—what took you so long?" she asked, sounding uncharacteristically chipper. I studied her carefully. She was hiding something—there was no way she was all right already.

"Oh, just had to grab something I forgot in my room," I said evasively.

She seemed to accept my answer. "All right. Well, Frank was looking for you."

I brightened at once. "Really? What did he say?"

Although Frank and I weren't going out, I'd liked him since…well, since forever. And now Lily is saying that he's come up to her a few times to ask about me. She's convinced that he's going to ask me to Hogsmeade, but I don't care if he takes me to Hogsmeade or not as long as he likes me. In my opinion, he's one of the sweetest guys at Hogwarts—clumsy sometimes, but very sweet.

"He just asked me where you were," she said. "I think he wants to ask you to Hogsmeade!" She seemed like she was trying to sound excited for me but I could tell that she was still upset.

"Where is he?" I said, deciding to talk to her about it later. This was _Frank Longbottom_, after all!

"I think he's in the Great Hall," she said. "Um, listen, I've got to go to the library. Got to finish that Herbology assignment, you know." I didn't mention that I already knew she had finished it two days ago. She needed her space, I told myself. Besides, Frank was waiting.

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Okay. I made a mistake. I NEVER should have allowed Lily anywhere NEAR the library. It's become her refuge or something—every time I can't find her (which includes free periods, breakfast, lunch, dinner, break, and some classes), she's in the library, bent over some book and writing furiously. I thought it was going to be something to help her get over this whole thing faster, but it's been going on for a week now. A WEEK. And he's not even her boyfriend or anything! (That comment was made under the assumption that she's agonizing over JAMES, not Sirius.)

I finally confronted her about it when I found her in my dorm in her old bed, a rare occurrence as I now suspected that she even slept in the library.

"What are you trying to do to yourself, Lily?" I said, resigned. She looked up from the textbook she was clutching.

"What are you talking about?" she said innocently, staring determinedly at something in the middle of my forehead. I wondered briefly if I had a spot there.

"You know what I'm talking about. Look at yourself, Lily. You have shadows under your eyes, your hair is completely limp, and your clothes hang off your body like you're a skeleton. I don't even remember the last time you've eaten. You have to fix whatever has happened to you," I said gently. Her face hardened.

"I'm fine. All right? There's nothing the matter with me except for the fact that you keep hounding me about MY body. Just leave me alone!" Lily snapped, grabbing the curtains around her old four-poster and wrenching them around to hide her bed. I stared at them, shocked. Hounding her? This was the first time I had said anything! To her face, that is.

I opened the hangings cautiously, hoping she didn't have her wand out. Lily had a mean hex when she wanted to hurt someone – just ask James.

Or not.

I stopped in astonishment when I saw her. She was curled by her pillow, the textbook (Defence Against the Dark Arts—we had a test in three weeks) discarded on the mattress somewhere by her feet. But what surprised me was that she was crying. Not the loud, self-pitying sobs I was accustomed to, but silent, streaming tears that left spots on the blanket under her.

"Oh, Lily," I said, both worried and amazed. What had happened to her? Was she pregnant? Did her owl die? This couldn't be about James. (Although if it was I was going to track him down and kick him **hard** in areas best left unmentioned.)

She whimpered and buried her head further into her arms. I don't think I had ever seen her look as pitiful as she did now—this sort of crying was something I had never experienced before.

"Lily," I said, gently sitting down next to her. "What's wrong? Please tell me what's wrong." I could hear the fear in my voice—what if something horrible had happened? God, please let her be all right—

"I'm such an _idiot_."

The suddenness of her voice nearly sent me careening off the bed, but it was the tone of it that was scarier. It was calm, almost normal. The only thing that gave her away was the tiny, barely noticeable tremor behind her words.

"Oh, Lily, are you still on about James?" I said, both confused and relieved that it wasn't something else, something worse. "Because if you are, don't worry about it. It looks like he's over it now—look at how he is in class."

I wasn't lying. That week, far from reacting the way Lily had, James had acted perfectly normal, laughing and causing trouble with his friends, as if he didn't remember a word of what had passed between him and Lily over the weekend. It seemed that Sirius had been telling the truth when he said that James had forgiven him. The only difference was that instead of talking and staring at Lily, he hadn't even spared a glance in her direction, although I had seen her sneak glances in his. Curiously enough, he had even moved on to the extent that he was hanging around Lauren almost all of the time. She, too, appeared to have forgotten all about Sirius and was positively basking in James's sudden attention to her. Lily had either refused or denied the existence of such a union, for she had said nothing of it, though I secretly suspected she was more bothered by it than she let on, since she constantly and covertly stared at them whenever they were together.

Somehow, in my effort to console her, I managed only to make her misery worse, for she burst into fresh peals of tears, though they still weren't the wracking sobs she normally had. "Of _course _it's not all about Potter!" she said, and I felt a sudden spasm of fear take hold of me again. Maybe she _was _pregnant! She shut her eyes tightly and tried to calm her nerves. "When'll everyone be back from wherever they are?"

"Um, not until late," I said, conveniently forgetting to say _where _they were. Although I didn't know about the others, I knew Lauren was somewhere with James—she'd been going on about it all day, something that Lily, if she had been her usual self, would have noticed. "What's the matter?"

Fresh tears leaked out of the corners of Lily's eyes, but instead she flung herself over the side of the bed and returned with a crumpled slip of paper. "Here," she said, thrusting it under my nose. I unfolded it and began reading with trepidation.

_Lily —_

_You're probably wondering why I'm writing. I wouldn't be, but Mum made me and is actually planning to watch me tie this to this ugly, feathered post-box replacement you call an owl._

_I'm engaged. I'm not going to bother telling you his name since I want you to be involved as little as possible anyway. He's a very respectable man and doesn't know anything about any of the abominable nonsense YOU deal with. If you ever meet him, which I hope to God you don't since he'll NEVER want to marry me after that, don't you dare say anything about your—disability. _

_Mum says to invite you to the wedding. I'm doing it right now, but just know that I don't want you to come. You'll spoil it, just like you always spoil everything. _

_This is the best thing that's ever happened to me and I don't want you ruining it. Don't come. That's the only present I want from you—for once, do what I'm asking you to do. It's during your school year—just say you have a test and can't come or something. We all know what a bookworm and a prude you are; it shouldn't be hard._

_Mum and Dad have always felt more proud of you than me since you joined that freak school. For once, let me have my moment._

— _P. Evans_

Oh God. Oh my God. I couldn't believe—I clenched the paper in my hand, fury gathering inside of me. I had heard stories of Petunia, of course, but this was the first time I honestly wanted to track her down and kill her now. "Lily…" I said, my own voice trembling now, "Oh God, Lily, don't listen to her. She doesn't know what the hell she's talking about. She—you don't need her."

"She's my sister. What am I supposed to think?" Lily said conversationally. I stared at her. In the time it had taken for me to read the letter, her tears had dried and she had set herself up so she was sitting cross-legged in the middle of the bed.

She looked perfectly serene.

"What are you talking about, Lily?" I said, shocked for the millionth time that day. "Are you listening to what you're saying? You're practically killingyourself, Lily! You're my best friend, what do you want me to do? What are you going to _let _me do?"

She didn't say anything. Her face remained composed in a mask of tranquility. Something inside me crumbled at her expression.

Over the years, Lily had taken more shit from her sister than I ever would have had Petunia been in my family. During the summer, Lily often came over to my house for weeks at a time just to get away from her. Petunia had tried to keep her life as far removed from Lily's as possible, calling her hurtful names when their parents weren't around to listen. Lily wasn't nearly as cold or mean as people at school sometimes thought—over and over, she tried to make peace with Petunia, and every time something happened between them she blamed herself. Although Lily wasn't completely blameless in the situation (I remember, with distinct pride, a certain incident involving frog spawn), Petunia was definitely far more to blame.

"What's happened to you?" I said, half-wonderingly and half-miserably. "Lily, look at what you've become! This thing with the library, your sudden no-eating policy – you're all ready way too skinny. You've been distant all week—you didn't even ask me what Frank asked me when I found him. You used to care about these things—I haven't seen you take points off someone for pulling a prank in days. How—what —" I stopped, lost for words. Now that I was listing things off, they sounded even more serious than before.

Lily's mask crumbled as my words wore her down. "Alice!" she whimpered, and then I reached out and hugged her as she started sobbing into my robes. "I'm such—a—terrible—p-person—" And then she lost it, sobbing wretchedly and crying just as loud as she normally did.

"You're not a terrible person," I said, reeling from her sudden—though not entirely unexpected—mood swing. "Why would you be terrible?"

She backed away from me, her eyes darker and scarier than they had been the last week because her mascara, the only make-up she had bothered putting on, was running down her face. "I—I don't ask about F-frank, I'm selfish, I s-say awful things t-to James, my own sister h-h-hates me, S-Sirius hates me, J-James hates me, I'm m-mean to y-y-you so much I w-wonder why you stick with me, I'm u-ugly, I'm a t-t-terrible Head Girl and I d-don't deserve the p-p-position, I—"

I had to stop her. The way she was going, she could have continued forever—and I was shocked enough that she had so many insecurities that I had never even known about. Most had arisen in the past week, but that's not the point. I had always held Lily up on a pedestal, thinking that she was somehow smarter, nicer, and prettier than other girls were. I knew she wasn't perfect, of course; I was too close to her _not _to realize that, but the way she talked about herself made me wonder if she looked in the mirror and saw a troll.

"Lily, how can you even _begin _to call yourself all those things?" I said. She refused to look up at me, her shoulders drooping as though she carried the weight of the world on her shoulders. "Listen to me. You are _not _a terrible person. You may have made some mistakes in the past, but that doesn't make you a horrible girl! If you want, I'll tell you all about Frank—you don't know what you've got yourself into, here. Later, though, because I want to do it when you're in a happier mood. Besides, I knew that you were stressed out and I didn't want to try and push my own life on you while you had your own things to think about. As for James, I've told you time and time again—you can't do anything about it. I don't think he even really cares anymore —"

"That's the problem!" Lily interrupted, her eyes shimmering as she looked at me. Surprised, I stopped talking. "That's the problem, Alice! I was so mean to him all this time and I had so many chances and now—"

She cut herself off but not before I understood what she had intended to say.

"Lily—do you like him now?" I said, shocked.

"Of course not," she said automatically, her voice clipped and short. "I just don't like people hating me."

"And that explains the whole I-had-so-many-chances, doesn't it." I said dryly.

"Just drop it, Alice. He's a good person and I did something really awful, that's all. All I was going to say was that I had so many chances to make things right between us."

Still dubious, I followed her advice and stopped talking. The silence only lasted for a few minutes before Lily broke it.

"Alice?"

"Hmm."

She hesitated. "I'm sorry."

And I knew that no matter what happened with James or Sirius or Petunia, everything was going to be all right.

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_I'm terrible, aren't I? No one's ever going to review again. I know I promised to have the next chapter (this chapter) up in two weeks, but I unexpectedly ran into a ton of difficulties. For one, I remembered my trip to Mexico planned for the 31__st__. And then I got a load of tests and projects to do early in preparation for that since I'll be skipping a week of school, so I had to get that done. And THEN I had a bunch of problems with my laptop, so I had to get THAT sorted. Now I just have an AP test to study for. _

_Anyway – hopefully this chapter flowed all right. I know there was a lot of stuff going on and was EXTREMELY emotional, especially after the last chapter, which was a bit of a filler, but I hope that was a good thing. (Not the emotional part, but the fact that there was a bunch of stuff going on.) My one difficulty with switching POV's is that the characters' personalities do a bit of a U-turn every chapter. Like Lily's all lighthearted and sarcastic in one chapter and all of the sudden she's this frigid bitch in the next. I've tried to pay attention to it, but, like I said, it's a bit of a problem. I just hope you didn't really notice too much._

_I probably don't deserve them, but…review??? Please???_


	8. Confrontations

**The Head Boy**

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**Chapter Eight: Confrontations**

**Lily**

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If there's one thing that I dislike above all else it's people hating me.

It all began in first grade at Muggle primary school when I accidentally turned Wanda Phillips' hair bright purple. No one knew quite what had happened since this was before I received my acceptance letter to Hogwarts, but Wanda immediately blamed me, mainly because we had gotten in a fight the day before about our reading books. (I had been positive that she had switched them out when she discovered that hers had tattered edges and several ripped pages compared to my new copy. She, of course, insisted that mine was ripped from the start and the teacher took her word over mine.) Either which way, Wanda made sure the rest of my time in primary school was a living hell. She spread nasty rumors about me that made the girls whisper behind their hands and the boys pull my hair when I sat in front of them at lunch. By the time I found out that I was a witch, almost every girl in my class had given me the classic line of "We don't want to be your friend anymore."

So you see why my Hogwarts letter was received with a mixture of excitement and relief. Finally, I thought, I would get away from Wanda Phillips and people would start to like me again! Unfortunately it was then that Petunia decided that I was a freak and didn't deserve her confidence. Magic, witchcraft, and everything that had to do with my "abnormal" world was out of the picture. _I _was out of the picture.

Disheartened, certainly, but nonetheless hopeful for a better future, I set out to King's Cross on the first of September only to discover that there was no such thing as Platform Nine and Three Quarters. After standing there helplessly for at least ten minutes, my parents scratching their heads confusedly while I scrambled around in a panic, I came across a group of hugely tall boys dragging trunks and cages with owls in them. Breathless, I watched them go through the barrier one by one until all but the last had gone through. Right before he broke into a run, his eyes caught mine and he smiled maliciously, glancing at my clueless parents before sneering, "First year, Mudblood? Well, good luck—you're going to need it."

Looking back on it, I don't even really remember if he said "Mudblood" or not. But I do remember his green and silver tie and his mean eyes as they glared down on me, so I suppose it's not too impractical to suppose that he did. Shortly after that I had my first run-in the Potter and Black, who I'm quite sure detested me from the start due to my rule-abiding standards that were so different from their own. Even discounting them I was always a "favorite" of the Slytherins and other Pureblooded maniacs—that is, if being a favorite means that hexes constantly get fired after you in the hallways and you get called all manner of obscenities.

After seven years, I've gotten used to bearing the hatred of Wanda Phillips. I've grown accustomed to the constant taunting from the Slytherins. I've even resigned to Petunia's continual nastiness, although it still strikes me hard every time she says something particularly abhorrent. But James Potter hating me…that's something I haven't gotten used to. James had always treated me fairly well compared to other people, despite the constant pranks and date proposals. He's generally liked around the school, thought not by the Slytherins, and for me to do something to hurt _him_, Hogwarts' golden boy, Quidditch star, and all-around hero, was despicable. Especially when he had done nothing to earn it apart from falling for the one girl that least deserved him.

Me.

Come to think of it, I don't even know why I gained James' attention in the first place. I'm just Lily Evans; nothing too extraordinary there. Even though I wasn't exactly a hag, Lauren Laffontein was much prettier than me. And I hardly think that boys these days go after brains and prudish know-it-alls rather than people like her. Because that's what I am — a prudish know-it-all. Why would anyone, let alone James, want to go out with _that_?

And now I've proven it to everyone that I'm not good enough for him. Poor old Lily Evans; she could have had James Potter at her beck and call but she gave it up for a selfish whim that she hadn't even planned out. Now there's no going back for a second chance.

Alice asked me the other day why I was so bothered by the fact that James hated me. Honestly, I don't have an answer. Maybe it's because I really started to like him—as a friend, mind—in these past few weeks when I was trying to be civil rather than instantly jump to conclusions. All I know is that I miss him now. It's hard to keep myself from looking over there at himand Sirius and Lauren, with whom he's begun hanging out. I know that Alice has seen the looks and probably suspects something, but honestly, I just miss his company. That's all.

I suppose it was a bit of a lie the other day, then, when I told Alice that I was feeling depressed because of my sister. I think that was just the final card that toppled the castle. I couldn't deal with it all—Petunia hating me, Sirius hating me, James hating me, Alice feeling left out by me… But most of it, I think, had to do with James. It's just that I've never had someone that close to me feel so crushed because of something I did. I can't get it out of my head; that expression on his face several weeks ago when I told him I would always want to be friends, nothing more. It doesn't sound so bad when I word it like that, but it was. It was much, much worse than that.

It doesn't seem like he's been much affected by it, though. Every time I see him he's with Lauren and Sirius, laughing like nothing happened the other week. Sometimes I get the feeling that I'm being watched, but every time I look in his direction he's facing the opposite way talking animatedly, usually with Lauren. I finally decided that the feeling's just because I want to feel like I'm important enough to be watched. That being said, I ignored him as much as possible.

"As much as possible" being the key words.

"Hey, Lily, can I copy your Charms notes?" Emmeline Vance said, coming up from behind me and sitting down by the Gryffindor table next to me.

"Oh, er, yeah," I stuttered, reaching in my bag and absentmindedly leafing through a folder of mixed papers while my eyes wandered up the table.

James was even eating with Lauren now.

"Here," I said, turning away quickly and forcing smile to accompany the short stack of papers clasped in my hands.

"Thanks, I was sick. So what's up with you and Potter now?" Emmeline said, her mind clearly on things other than Charms.

"I—er—I don't know. Nothing," I stammered, my voice higher than usual as my eyes swept inadvertently to my left. I looked away quickly when I realized he was facing my way, my heart hammering in my chest. She raised an eyebrow.

"Nothing? So what's with the…" She mimed my constant twisting around exaggeratedly, wriggling her eyebrows up and down. "You fancy him now?"

"No!" I said quickly. "Why is everyone keep asking me that?"

She smirked. "Sounds like someone's in de-nial!" she chirped in a sing-song voice as Alice came up from behind her and plopped her bag on the seat across from Emmeline.

"Who, Lily?" she said breezily, grabbing a dish full of mashed potatoes and scooping them onto her plate. I made a choking nose in my throat that made it sound like I had a deranged parrot stuck in my craw. Not a very pleasant thing to hear, I might add.

"_What_? What are you talking about?" I squawked, blinking tears from my eyes as I gulped down a glass of water in an attempt to clear my throat.

"Face it, Lily, why else would you be so bothered by it?" Alice said practically.

"I—I don't like people hating me!" I squeaked as soon as I got the water past my throat. "Honestly, I'm not in denial—"

"Are we talking about Lily?" Rebecca Clearwater said, sidling up to us and carrying her plate and her book bag.

"Argh!" I released an incoherent, half-strangled cry and dropped my face into my hands. "Some mates you lot are!"

"Come on, Lily, it's fairly obvious to anyone with eyes," Emmeline said. "You stare at him all the time. I have only, what, one class with you? And even I can tell." She elbowed Rebecca in the ribs. "Can't you?"

"Yeah, it's pretty obvious," Rebecca agreed. Then, twisting around in her seat to look around conspiratorially to make sure no one was listening, she added, "Although, I don't know what he's doing with Laffontein. What does he see in her, anyway? They never hung out before."

"Come off it, she's way prettier than I am," I said before I could stop myself. They all looked at me, stunned into silence for just a second before they burst into laughter. Groaning, I hid my face in my hands again and resolved never to lift my head again.

"You're jealous, aren't you!" cried Emmeline.

"No, I'm not, I'm just stating a fact—" I began, but it was too late.

"Lily, you are _much_ prettier than her," Rebecca assured me. "Look at her! Blonde, blue eyes, _completely_ skinny—"

"Are you saying I'm fat?" I demanded at the same time that Alice yelped, "What's wrong with blonde hair and blue eyes?"

"Nothing, I was just saying her type's pretty common," Rebecca said, rolling her eyes. "And please, Lily, you are _anythin_g but fat. You're like a twig, for heaven's sakes! She just looks more unnatural than you. I mean, look at your hair and your eyes, they're bloody gorgeous—"

"Hi, do you mind if we join you?"

We all stopped talking mid-sentence, staring guiltily up at Lauren Laffontein and Piper Anderson. Lauren appeared not to notice, taking the seat right next to me and grabbing a roll off the plate. Actually it was more like _daintily taking _the roll; I swear she moves like a weightless princess. A beautiful, flawless, weightless princess. Blegh.

"So what were you talking about? We could hear you laughing all the way down from the table," Piper said conversationally. She winked at me and added, "Well, we heard _you _all laughing; we _saw_ Lily getting red as a tomato."

True to her words, my entire face reddened when she said that. Everyone started to laugh again, though it was considerably more forced than before.

"So." My head jerked towards Emmeline, who had a calculating smile on her face as she stared at Lauren. Crap, I thought, crossing my fingers and sending her a vicious glare out of the corner of my eye in the hopes that she wouldn't mention James. Please, please, please—

"When did you and Potter tie the knot?"

Damn. Well, I suppose it was too much to ask for. I had to restrain all of my senses to keep from turning towards Lauren in the hopes of giving the illusion that I didn't care what her answer was. As it was, I don't think I've ever been listening so hard in my life.

"Oh!" said Lauren. She sounded slightly disappointed but nevertheless didn't pass up the opportunity to relay a scrap of gossip. "Well, he hasn't asked me yet or anything, but he's definitely talking to me more now." She frowned. "Actually, it was more Sirius that pulled me into the group. He said something about James needing a girl but so far James hasn't really been himself or talked all that much lately."

I listened disbelievingly. Not been talking all that much? Good grief, every time I looked over there he was laughing along next to her. And let me tell you, I don't glance in his direction only once or twice a day.

Not that that means anything.

"Wait a second," Alice chimed in. "I thought Sirius asked you out last Hogsmeade trip."

"Yes, well, that sort of fell through," Lauren said. "But I'm okay. I mean, I never stopped liking James anyway."

"Doesn't match up with what she told us a few weeks ago," Alice mumbled under her breath so only I could hear. I fought back a smile, not that it was too difficult. Hearing James' name from those perfectly glossed lips made me feel sick for some reason.

"You know what, I'm going to head over to the library," I said quickly, standing up grabbing my bag with one last glance in James' direction. Was it just me, or did it look like he had just turned his head rapidly in the opposite direction? Then again, I was sitting next to the Beautiful, Flawless, Weightless, and Utterly Perfect Lauren Laffontein.

"Oh, I'll go with you! I have to finish that dreadful essay Binns gave us," Lauren said, standing up as well. "Do you mind?"

I followed her with a hollow, distant sort of feeling drumming through my ears. When I looked back at the table Alice, Emmeline, and Rebecca were grinning wickedly and giving me cheeky thumbs-up signs, apparently not noticing that Piper had just begun to talk about Edmund Patil. Then again, I don't blame them; she's been talking about him nonstop for weeks now. I stuck my tongue out at them and sped up so that Lauren had to take longer steps to keep up with me.

"So how are you doing lately? I just wanted to ask you in private—I mean, I really do have an essay to do, but I wanted to know if you were okay," Lauren rambled as we walked up the third corridor steps. "I mean, I heard you had a blowout with James the other week—"

"You _heard_ about that?" I sputtered, almost forgetting to skip the trick step as I turned to gawk at her. "Who told you?"

"Well, I didn't mean to find out, really," Lauren said, not noticing my outburst. "It was just that James and Sirius were acting a bit strangely and when I asked them what was wrong they just glared in your direction."

I felt oddly deflated.

"Oh."

"So you're okay then?" she continued, blithely ignorant that my self-confidence was currently plummeting to negative one thousand feet. "I was fairly certain that you were; I mean, it couldn't have been all that awful if you were over there having fun with your friends—"

Pfft. I resisted the urge to snort at her comment. Having fun? More likely being slowly tortured on a long walk to the guillotine.

"—just wanted to check if you were still okay with that. I mean, I know nothing's really happened yet, but I'd date him in a second if he asked me."

I looked up from my avid perusal of the ground, slightly annoyed. Was it just me, or did she just ask me if I would be all right if she and James dated in the same sentence that she said she would do it anyway? I didn't know what to say.

"I—yes, go ahead, I don't really care what you do," I said, the words falling out of my mouth unthinkingly. I didn't try to stop them. After all, what claim did I have over James? I was only the snot that repeatedly turned him down and shoved it back in his face with a sharpened spade full of hippogriff dung.

Or something like that.

She smiled in a way that made me think that she hadn't heard a word that I had said. "Right, thanks. He's gotten so much better looking over the summer, have you noticed? Much taller, and you can just tell those muscles didn't come from driving an aumotobile." I didn't bother to correct her; merely walked along and thought miserably about what a boring conversation this was. It never really occurred to me before but I was just realizing now how completely different we were. I don't think we have anything in common now.

"…I'm just surprised he's moved on. I figured that you never liked him much so it's about time, but still! It feels a little unreal."

"What?" I said, snapping back into the conversation.

"You can't tell me that you don't see it?" she said, smiling at my perplexed expression. "He's chased you for years, Lily; I'm shocked that he gave up so fast. I doubt it's even permanent. Honestly, the most I'm looking for is a fling. I don't have anything to compare to you—you're bloody gorgeous _and _you're Head Girl!"

I decided to overlook the fact that Lauren appeared to be under the delusion that one could not be both smart and pretty. It felt odd enough hearing her call me gorgeous, especially since I was a bloody hag next to her.

"I—I'm not—" I floundered, searching for words. Even though I was Head Girl and hardly plain looking (though I was nowhere near "gorgeous" like she described me), no bloke would date me after they found out that I had a horrible temper, one that even managed to hurt James Potter. _Though_, a tiny voice in the back of my head whispered, _you said yourself that he didn't look too upset by the information_. I shook it off. Maybe I was more traumatized by the events than James, but that didn't make my actions any less despicable.

We reached the library doors and began the long and strenuous search for an empty table, attempting to find a space left exempt from the post-lunch scramble. We located one in the back and sat down, leaving me to mechanically pull out my parchment and my Transfiguration textbook. I didn't really have any homework to do; I had just wanted to get away from Lauren. Bloody well that worked.

Taking out her quill and her History of Magic essay, Lauren managed to scrawl three words down before launching into a gossiping spree about some Ravenclaw or another. As I pretended to pay attention, my eyes not really focusing on anything in front of me, I mulled over what she said. _He's chased you for years, Lily…he's not going to give up that fast…I don't have anything compared to you!…_

_Stop it!_ I thought fiercely, shaking my head and scratching the quill viciously across my parchment in a violent pattern of meaningless dots and squiggles. _Why do you bloody care anyway, Lily? You don't fancy him. He's your friend and that's all it's going to be. That's all it will ever be, because of what you've done. Because of your stupid, egotistical, selfish personality there won't be any more late night discussions, or comfortable Head meetings, or quick-witted bantering—_

I shut my eyes to keep the sudden tears from leaking out.

I fancied James Potter.

Alice, Emmeline, and Rebecca were all right; I had been in denial all along. All of those times I had been insisting that we were merely friends only prolonged the inevitable judgment: that I had finally given into Potter, my childhood adversary. I don't know what did it—the sudden change of heart; his mature, clever, charming personality… All I know is that I now have a mammoth problem on my hands that I could have avoided if I had only realized it sooner. I couldn't go back now and expect to be able to beg forgiveness and have him to feel the same way he had before our argument. Besides, I told Lauren only minutes ago that I didn't care if she dated him. Not, of course, that she had been listening.

Distressed, I pushed back my chair and made to grab my things. Lauren's chattering dissipated as she glanced up, surprised by my troubled expression. "…And then she—are you all right?" she broke off, momentarily jarred out of her spiel.

"Yes—yes, I'm—you know what, actually, I'm not fine," I said, the words escaping from my mouth before I could help it. "I do have a problem with you dating James," I continued, knowing I was going to regret this later. This sudden epiphany would most likely prove more destructive than helpful. I pressed on anyway, ignoring my throbbing intuition. "I know I said otherwise earlier but I do have a problem with it. And I know I'm probably sounding like a completely psychotic, impulsive idiot right now but I just can't stand the thought of you dating James," I finished, burning as I felt the stares of a half-dozen second years that looked much more interested in our mini-soap opera than the Herbology textbooks in front of them.

"Er, what?" Lauren said, at a loss for words for the first time in her life.

"I—" I couldn't think of anything to say. And what could I, really? I don't really know how I could make it any clearer to her that I HAD A PROBLEM WITH HER DATING JAMES.

"Lily, I honestly don't see what the big deal is. You had a fight! Besides, you said you didn't like him," Lauren said dismissively, her tone suggesting that she was speaking to a very dim-witted person. "Anyway, my relationship with James was just going to be a fling. A few dates here and there and that's it. You're acting like a jealous girlfriend. Get a hold of yourself, Lily!"

"Hello, Laffontein. Evans," a voice addressed us from somewhere behind me. I whirled around, furious at the interruption. Sirius Black raised an eyebrow at me. I was quick to notice that his expression was the closest to teasing as I had seen it in the past several days.

"Who are you talking about?" he said, drawing the words out and making me flush from embarrassment.

"No one," I spat, hurling my things in my bag once again and shoving my chair in the table. Typical me, to push in my chair after a fight with someone. Sometimes I amaze even myself. "Not a bloody thing, Black, now get out of my way."

He smirked. "Not until I know who you were talking about."

"None of your business—" I snarled, only to be interrupted by Laffontein.

"Actually, Sirius," she began stupidly, batting her eyelashes up at him. I resisted the urge to roll my eyebrows. Couldn't keep off flirting to a second, could she? I felt reduced to the status of a dung beetle knowing that I had ever felt any semblance of jealousy for her. "We were talking about James."

I glared at her through my eyelashes. Sirius wasn't even involved in this! What did she want, for him to come in on her side? Somehow I doubt she would have much trouble with that.

"Prongs?" Sirius asked, the smirk slipping off his face before he hitched it back on. "Well, well, well, Lily, getting a little possessive?" His eyes, a shade darker than what I remembered, dared me to comment. As it is, all I could do was glower and hope that my cheeks weren't as red as they felt. "You're not really in the position to feel that way, are you?"

"Sod off, Black; I don't need you to rub it in," I snapped, rubbing my hand over my face in a futile attempt to clear my emotions and my watery eyes. Honestly, what was it with me and crying lately? Maybe I needed to go see a therapist. Then again, maybe not—imagine what that would do to my already flailing reputation.

He took a step toward me. I didn't break my eye contact, although I could see Lauren standing across the table from me with her arms crossed, waiting eagerly to see some sort of explosion that she would be able to spread around the school. It seems odd to think that we had gone from being on completely civil terms (outwardly, at least) to practically biting each other's throats out. Then again, I suppose that sums up girls for you.

"Don't think," I began, my voice wavering treacherously for a bare instant before I managed to calm it, "that I don't regret it, Black. Don't even begin to think that. You can tell your stupid best friend that I'm sorry for what I did and I've wished a thousand times I didn't do it, but don't you dare think that I don't regret it."

Sirius' eyes flashed oddly, but his gaze remained stubbornly unreadable. Something in it seemed to have softened in between now and the time of his last words, though. "Maybe," he said, speaking slowly and meaningfully, "you should tell him that, Evans. You never did, did you?"

And with that he dropped my arm, which he had grasped without my noticing, and departed from the library, leaving me to stare after him vacantly with his words swimming around in the empty space between my ears.

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"Hello, Remus," I said an hour later, having found the only Marauder I was on speaking terms with sitting next to the fire in Gryffindor Tower. "Might I speak to you for a second?"

He looked up at me, his eyes hooded with dark circles and his clothes hanging rather dismally off his thin frame. He looked awful. "Go ahead," he said warily, nodding to the space on the couch next to him.

I sat down gingerly, pulling my bag into my lap in a sudden bout of insecurity. "Er—I know that we haven't spoken in a while, what with…" I trailed off, not wanting to elaborate on everything that I had spent far too much time analyzing already.

"I know," Remus said wearily. I bit my lip.

"Er, yes. I just wanted to—" I broke off and ran my fingers through my hair, wondering how to ask this without somehow turning this into another Sirius fiasco. "I'll understand if you don't want to answer this, because I know you're probably ticked with me as well, actually I'd be shocked if you weren't, but I just wanted to ask you…"

I hesitated again, fully aware that Remus looked impatient. "How's James?" I blurted suddenly. Remus frowned, which I immediately took as a bad sign. "Right, that was a stupid question. It's none of my business, sorry for asking. I'm betraying your trust as his friend right now. I'm sorry, I'll just be going—"

I hoisted myself off the couch and made to make a quick released only to be stop by Remus' voice. "No, you don't have to go. Hang on a second."

I turned back slowly to give him an appraising frown. An expression of amusement accompanied his normally somber face. "Listen, Lily," he began, leaning forward and carefully marking the page of the book he had been reading. "I don't think that you got into this whole mess because you're a particularly malicious person. Oblivious, maybe, but not malicious."

I winced. It wasn't a very complimentary picture of me, but I suppose it could have been worse.

"The main problem with what you've been doing is that you haven't talked to James at all," he continued. "You've spoken to virtually every other person between the two of you about your fight except for him. You've talked to me, Sirius, Lauren from what I heard a minute ago, Alice, and God knows how many of your other friends. But it seems to me that there were only two main parties involved from the beginning. Maybe you should just start there for a change." His eyes looked up at me bemusedly, dark gray or brown from the firelight; I couldn't tell.

"I…" I didn't know what to say. Remus had always been rather deep and observant, but I don't think I've ever really paid as much attention to it as this time. But, as usual, he was right. I had been leaving out the most important person in this situation largely because of my own cowardice.

My mind made up, I said, "Thanks, Remus. Do you know where I can find James?"

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When I found James just after Quidditch practice he was still out flying around the pitch while the rest of the team went into the locker room to change. I watched him for a while, wringing my hands in front of me while trying to collect my thoughts. I had no idea what I was going to say to him.

Finally, as I watched him swerve into a steep dive and pull up neatly on the freshly mowed lawn, making me gasp into my hands before I realized he was too good on a broomstick to fall off, I knew that I had to speak to him now. I didn't want to risk another week going by without saying anything. Quickly jumping down from the bleachers, I ran in the direction of the locker room, coming up behind him right before he reached out to open the doors.

"James," I said to get his attention. My stomach knotted with anxiety as I waited for his response.

He turned around, broom over his shoulder, not looking surprised in the least to see me. He nodded to me once, just enough to be polite. "I saw you on the stands," he said shortly by way of explanation.

"O—oh," I said. My tongue groped around in my mouth, searching for words to say. He didn't care. He didn't care at all anymore. What was I here to say again? I couldn't remember—that expression on his face, the completely unreadable one, threw me off.

"Er…so what do the odds look like?"

I nearly hexed myself right then. Quidditch, at a time like this? I berated myself, feeling my face turn brick red in embarrassment.

His eyebrows jutted together for the briefest of moments, reflecting my own surprise back at me, before his face returned to that awful, apathetic expression. "Dunno," he said expressionlessly, waving the hand not clasping his broom vaguely in the direction of the Ravenclaw stands. "They've gotten a bit better. Chang's improved over the summer and McKinnon's arm isn't half bad."

"Great, that's great. I'm sure you lot'll bag it," I said miserably, probably making no sense at all as I was only half-listening. I tried to focus in on the swirl of panic encompassing my brain. (Or what remained of it, anyway. I think all this fretting has diced it into Swiss cheese.) "I, er," I started, wracking my brain for another topic of conversation. "It's really lovely weather today, isn't it, perfect for outdoors—" Thank God for the weather!

"It's bloody four degrees, Evans, and it looks like it's going to rain any minute now."

"Oh," I said, at a loss as to what to say, my mind stuck on the way he had called me "Evans." I stared at my feet, noting absentmindedly that there were large, distinctive prints walking in the direction the door was in with huge _X_s in the middle. I wondered if they were his.

He sighed audibly. I looked up to see him running his hand through his hair and looking up at the sky as though wishing he could be anywhere but here. Anywhere but near me.

My throat tightened again.

"James—" I began, at the same time he started to say, "Look, Evans—" We both broke off again.

"Go ahead," he said after another short burst of silence.

"I—I've missed you," I said suddenly, looking away. I felt almost as surprised as he did, judging by the expression on his face. I hadn't really meant to say that.

"What—what I mean is—" I stumbled, searching for the right words. My eyes unwillingly flicked back to see him standing awkwardly next to the door, looking everywhere but at me. "I—I hate patrols now!" I said finally. His eyes shot up to meet mine for the first time in a month. I felt relieved and oddly liberated. Now that I'd started I just couldn't stop.

"It's just me and that Ravenclaw fifth year, Susan Bones' little sister, I can't even remember her name. Amy or Andrea or something. All we do is walk up and down the same corridors in the same order on every Monday and Wednesday and Friday and we don't speak at all, except to take off points, for two hours. And I can never talk to her about classes or people I know because she's in a different year and deathly shy at that. And I hate having to share a bathroom with my entire dormitory and wait for everyone to finish up before walking down to breakfast so I'm not on my own. And I hate that whenever I'm finished with my work in Charms or Transfiguration I don't have anyone to talk or pass notes to, and when I don't understand something I don't know who to ask for help that will bother trying to help me before we end up mucking around for a half hour since I can't stay focused. I—I just—"

I ran out of steam, my breath short and my cheeks steaming. I pressed my hands to my face, eyes trained on the ground, not daring to see what he might look like. The sudden silence hung in the air like it would in a graveyard.

He wasn't saying anything.

I finally dared to look up, nervous from the silence and wishing that anything, any type of distraction, would come and somehow obliterate this stillness between us. Never, not once in my entire relationship with James Potter, had our conversations reached this lack of action. Whether we were arguing or talking amicably there was always something going on between us, and now I wondered if this meant that I had screwed things up forever.

"What do you want me to say, Lily?" James said finally, meeting my eyes for the second time with a look far too intense to have accompanied his impassive face from before.

I noticed dimly that he said my first name. _Lily_. Not Evans anymore. Relief coursed through me.

"Really, what do you want me to say?" he continued. "I'm done with it. Maybe you're not, but I'm through. You loathe me; we've already established that, so I'm not going to bother getting mixed up with it again."

Something pricked in the back of my eyes. I could feel the anger starting to bubble, rising with far too many weeks of pent up emotion.

"Are you even bloody listening to me? I just went through—I just said—" I broke off, not being able to bring myself to say it again. He really thought that I hated him? A wave of sickness replaced my sudden burst of anger. I wouldn't be surprised to know if my posture slumped visibly.

"I'm sorry," I said, my entire voice laden with exhaustion. He didn't react, but somehow I knew he was listening. Or maybe that was just me _hoping_ he was listening. "I'm so sorry, James. I can honestly say that I thought it was all a big joke before, in fifth year, and that I didn't figure it out until—well, until Hogsmeade."

I swallowed and glanced away, my eyes fastening on a leaf floating in the air a hundred meters away. "And then I—I don't even know why I did it. I tried to hook you up with—with Lauren—" My voice soured even to my own ears, but I kept on, hoping he wouldn't notice. "Here was everyone around me saying that I had to stop leading you on, which I hadn't meant to do in the first place, and I just went along with it. I didn't realize—didn't realize what was going on then. I just wanted to be friends."

He still wasn't looking at me.

"I didn't fully realize what I was doing by using Sirius. It sounds incredibly stupid, but I didn't. All I wanted to do was to try and make it so you wouldn't get hurt. Right good job I did of that," I added bitterly. "I was so stupid. I've felt awful for weeks now, just thinking about, thinking that I could have made things better from the start if only I—"

"Stop."

My eyes snapped up to meet his pained ones now only a foot and a half away. "Stop, Lily. I've—I've moved on. I was being serious about that. I've forgiven Padfoot, and I'm forgiving you. It doesn't matter anymore."

I looked down, surprised at how disappointed and absolutely crushed I felt with that tiny string of sentences. It seems odd that so few words can make or break your day, but they can.

Break it, at least.

"So that's it?" I said, my voice monotone. "Everything goes back to the way it has been?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I think that would be best," he said, his own voice strained. I tried to disguise the confusion from my face. Did that mean we weren't speaking or that we were going to pretend to be friends like before? He attempted a grin as he knocked my chin very gently with his fist. "You can move back in the Head Tower now without worrying about running into me, at least."

Oh. So friends then. For some reason that didn't sound nearly as comforting as it would have a week ago.

"I wasn't worried about running into you. I didn't think you'd want someone like me hanging around," I said, forming a lopsided smile and shrugging my shoulders.

"Oh. All right, then," he said, unable to find words to combat my blunt statement. I laughed, a grating, fake sound that I hoped he wouldn't notice.

"So we're good, then?" I said.

"Yeah… yeah, we're good," he said, scratching his head and smiling sadly at me.

"Okay," I said, still standing there awkwardly. Not knowing what to do, I leaned forward and gave him a half-hug, not nearly as casual as the ones I exchanged with him before, and backed away again, feeling like I was about to cry. "So…I'll see you around."

"Yeah. Bye," he said, rubbing a hand underneath his glasses to wipe his eyes as if tired.

I only managed to take a few steps before I turned around, stopping him before he could make it to the locker room. "Are you—are you seeing Laffontein?" I cursed the words as soon as they left my mouth. Stupid, stupid, _stupid_ question.

He looked surprised to hear me say her last name instead of her first. "No," he said simply, and then let the door bang behind him so he could take his long-overdue shower.

As I walked back to the castle, I couldn't help remembering that I hadn't told him the one thing that I needed to the most throughout that entire conversation. Hinted at it, yes, but not said it. If I had it would have sounded utterly mad. It was too late to go back, anyway, and what could I say?

"Sorry to barge in on you again, James, but I forgot to mention it. I know you've said you're over me, probably because I'm such a horrible person, but I've recently discovered that I like you. Would you consider forgetting your intense dislike at my loathsome betrayal and ask me out again?"

…Like I said. Completely barmy.

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_An extra long chapter, that, with an absolute TON of action (for me, at least ;P). Hopefully you enjoyed all the drama – we're closing in on the end, now, so it won't be too long. If you guys review I'll try to update quickly—it's summer now, anyway, so I'll have slightly more time on my hands._

_Review, please! Good luck to everyone on exams!!_


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